Here I am, wrapping up finally(!) on our road trip which probably would have bore you by now. I did think of skipping this leg, but thought I should just end it nicely, even if it's for me to have a read in years to come. So here it is!
Epernay is a town very close to Reims and it is the champagne capital in France. Big champagne houses line the famous Avenue de Champagne and typically many tourists would throng this avenue looking at the big names and choose one or even a few tours to do. We only had time for one (and I do think one is sufficient) and I chose none other than the grand Moet et Chandon. I was very organised for this one, and called up the day before to book for an English tour. Tours on their website are conducted in French so yes a good tip is to call them up directly and ask for the English tour.
We had an hour before our tour and they kindly allowed us to park in their estate whilst we walked up the avenue. Pictures galore. The kids ran up and down having lots of fun. It was relatively quiet as there weren't many tourists when we were there, except for local French tourists. We saw a group of tourists who were probably in their 50s or 60s taking photos near us. We spoke with them and found out they were siblings who traveled down from Brittany together. It was pretty cool.
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| Moet et Chandon courtyard |
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| Izzy refusing to pose |
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| Another champagne house |
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This was actually a museum of some sort.
Not sure as we didn't go in.
The French siblings group of tourists helped to take this photo for us! |
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| Another champagne house, a smaller one but still beautiful |
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| Another one :) |
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| yes another one :) |
The Moet et Chandon champagne house is one of the first on the avenue and it's grand and beautiful.. Across the road they have their own private hotel for special guests, which included Napoleon back in the day, and it's out of bounds to commoners like us. The tour guide was interestingly a Japanese lady who took us through the entire process of champagne making, and it was insightful. The kids were not afraid when we went down to the cellar because it was a big group of us.
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Dom Perignon was a monk who lived in the village of Hautvillers nearby
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| A very old barrel given by Napoleon as he was a fan of Moet et Chandon's champagne |
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| A very vintage and prized bottle of champagne |
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| Cheers - to the end of the tour |
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| In the gift shop |
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| Small to Big |
Again at the end of it, we had a complimentary glass of Moet et Chandon in their courtyard. The kids were disappointed they didn't get their grape juice, but we didn't linger for too long as we had to rush for lunch before driving up to Calais for our train back to the UK that evening.
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| Lunch at La Banque which was really good. A recommendation by our tour guide. |
The 3h drive back was mostly quiet and peaceful as the kids took a nap in the car. We noted that the French countryside roads were very well maintained and that's because there were numerous road tolls along the way, the most expensive one being over 20EUR! To be fair most of them were below 5EUR throughout our drive.
Back at the French borders we were subjected to massive delays due to the extra Covid checks and extra paperwork to be filled in. Not much to say here except we were delayed by 3 trains and everyone were tired. We had expected to reach home around 8pm but ended up to be 11pm. Kudos to the kids who didn't fuss but sat patiently at the back while we chugged on.
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| At the French border |
Overall an extremely memorable trip for the family, one that would still be mentioned in years to come I think. Our first epic road trip adventure. Thank you for joining us virtually!
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