A few months ago we made reservations for a tour of Moet et Chandon (champagne!) in Eperney, and today was the day....starting with an alarm set for 5am! Why 5am? Well, there were only two English tours that day and we wanted to go to the one that started at 10:30am (rather than a late afternoon start), and there were two trains that would get us into Eperney - one arriving at 8:40am and one at 10:40am. Well, obviously the 10:40am wouldn't work, so the 8:40 arrival it was. Which meant a 7:10am departure, Which meant leaving the apartment to walk 30-minutes (and potentially get lost) by 6:30am. Which meant a damn early alarm! A few snoozes later, we finally got out of bed and got our act (read: asses) in gear and made our way to Gare l'Est (train station) in the dark - and just made our train as we were confused on how to get tickets and where to catch the train - neither of which were obvious to newbies. We arrived in Eperney at 8:40 and had nearly two-hours to kill, so we thought, "Hey, time for a sweet!" so we made our way to a bakery for tea and coffee (and we were finally getting better at ordering the right coffee for Brad) and a sweet....or two.....or three. At the bakery we talked with a couple brothers from Sri Lanka - and continued to run into them all day, which was fun because they were a riot.
After out multiple sweets, we wandered the streets of Eperney and the Avenue de Champagne.......
We made our way into the Moet et Chandon building to wait for our tour. This is a statue of Dom Perignon - here's the very abbreviated story - up until Dom Perignon (who was a monk) arrived on the scene, everything made was a still wine. Dom refined the methods to create sparkling wine, and thus we have champagne. Thanks Dom!
We looked around the gift shop for a while. Gee, this looks like a nice bottle of champagne....... we like rose......
So if you can afford to send us a few bottles, we'd appreciate it!
Finally our tour began (and the Sri Lankan brothers were on the tour) where we learned a ton about the making of champagne and Moet et Chandon, such as:
- Moet is always a cuvee (blend), unless there is an amazing year, then they do have vintage years, which will be on the label
- There are 110 km (68 miles) of storage below the cellar, each "vintage" in a different cave. (This is only for Moet et Chandon - there are other champagne makers in the area,)
- Champagne is not released for sale until it is ready to be enjoyed, so when you buy your champagne, there is no reason to "age" it - open and have us over!
So this is an example of one of the caves - they were of varying sizes, but not huge by any means, maybe 12 ft by 12ft. This one was full of Dom Perignon. Our tour guide told us how many bottles and the price for each bottle. Someone grabbed their cell phone and calculated....wanna guess? How much is this champagne valued? 93 million (yes million) Euros. Does the exchange rate even matter?
This is just for show - these kegs are not used.
Another 93 million euros?
Which makes one wonder - is it better to rob an armored truck or a Moet et Chandon truck?
Eventually bottles are tilted ad rotated to move the sediment from the bottom to the top so it can be released. Most is done by machine, but some are done by hand.
After the 45-minute tour, we had a tasting of two champagnes, By tasting, I mean two full glasses - at 11:30am! We had two Imperials - a white and a rose.
Yummy!
Money shot!
And a second one!
Cheers!
After our tour and "tasting," we walked around Eperney looking for a place for lunch - we found a small restaurant that was packed and thought, "Well, it must be good, everyone is here." Nope - not so much, In hindsight, most people were drinking, not eating. Probably the worst meal of the trip - worse than what we thought was the worst meal in Zermatt. When we were trying to order, the first waitress spoke only French. Okay - we can do this. Suzanne tried to order in French (while pointing at the menu) and after just two words, the waitress just walked away and yelled at the women working the bar. Apparently that woman spoke English and was happy to take our order - and let us point to the menu. However, the gruff waitress was gruff with everyone - not only us.
We eventually got our tickets back to Paris - but found out that what was usually a single train to Paris had been changed to a bus/train combo. There was major confusion about where to get the bus - one would think that the bus depot with about half-dozen buses would be the place - well nope. Lucky for us there was a Parisian woman who was also taking the same route home (who was also confused) and she was an immense help to us, the brothers, another couple, and everyone else who was confused.
The bus - full of teenagers. Loud teenagers. Eventually most got off and we continued on without them. (Ahhh....so quiet.) It was cool to see some of the countryside and vineyards as we wound our way to the train depot. We eventually all got on the train, arrived at Gare l'Est (where this all began), and we walked home - back at 6:30pm!
So alarm at 5am, three+ hours of travel (two trains, one bus), 45 minute tour, 30 minute tasting, back at 6:30pm. Long day. (In hindsight, we should have stayed in Eperney one night on our way to Paris from Zermatt. Live and learn. But it was fun. 😋)
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