Veronique Moves To France: Save Ya Knees N Bones....

Cause you're gonna need 'em to go wine tasting in Savigny les Beaune! (Sahv-ee-nee/leh/bone...get it??) Ok, so it was a cheap play on words....but that's what happens when you've had some wine to drink.

So I have a lot of bones to pick with France...but at the end of the day you gotta love 'em for the endless amounts of wine festivals they put on here! And this ain't no "1 oz" American wine tasting...these people pour you a whole glass! Hows that for "tasting" their wine? I don't know who is more under the influence at these ordeals....the tasters or the representatives. Granted most of the wine reps are country-hill billy-wine growing-old farts-who start each morning with a "petit blanc" (for you non-french speakers...'a little white'.....glass of wine) We all imagine the snobby wine reps in suits and ties telling you about the small little nuances of each particle in the wine that makes you feel like the size of a grape....but not here. These small wine festivals are to showcase the wine from that small region/village. So you get to meet the people who actually grow the wine, sing it to sleep each night, and who are the real deal. The folks with grape stained fingertips and talking to you in a style of french that you never learned in school.

Savigny les Beaune is a small village near Beaune which is near Dijon, where I live. Population: 1300. This village alone is home to 22 Premier Crus.....i.e. really good wine! So let's go!

Walking into town...

Get a load of Grandpa and his cane! Ain't nothin' stoppin' him from gettin' to some wine!

Gotta love the romanian mini carnival for the kids! All I have to say is romanian clowns are creepy!

There was a train to take you to the various wine tasting cellars in the village. Wine tasting is hard work!

Me in my element!

The pour souls we dragged into this adventure! We really had to twist their arms!

Oh, Paradise!

The chateau of the village. There were random military fighter planes in the gardens around this chateau, 81 to be exact, apparently the current chateau owner is a collector. They really added to the ambiance of the place....I mean who wouldn't decorate their chateau gardens with 81 fighter planes?

The quote on the entry to the chateau gardens says:

The wine of Savigny is nourishing, theological, and keeps death away! How true!

A wine village is not complete unless they have a basketball hoop of the San Antonio Spurs' Tony Parker on the wall.

So quaint!.....yes, I said quaint.

Feelin' pretty good!

"YOU GOTTA PROBLEM WITH ME WINE TASTING?"

Watch him turn those bottles of bubbly!

My turn!

*This is an old process of turning each bottle of bubbly by hand over a period of time, that allows the fine sediments from the yeast in the bubbly to settle in the neck of the bottle for easy removal before corking. This process called remuage is now done by machine but the old method of doing it by hand is still used in fine champagne making today.