134. Cultural visit

 We are on holiday in South West France: blue skies and sunshine, barbecued food and lazy afternoons by the pool ... All this is truly relaxing but I am getting a little restless.  

'There's a château nearby ... we could go and visit ...' 

'Mmmm ...' An unidentifiable sound comes from the direction of my husband.

'I said a château...' I am exaggerating my excellent French accent: 'Château' as in ... wine?'. 

'Really?' 

'Yes, really. It's about 15 minutes away. We can walk there. There's huge grounds for the kids to run wild and we can visit the actual castle - it's always nice and cool in those old places. By then it should be apéritif time ... so we can enjoy the free wine tasting and maybe buy a few bottles ... What do you say?'

No-one in their right mind could resist such a tempting afternoon, even a husband on holiday-mode. Soon we are off to the château which is well sign-posted so we reach it with no major drama.

As we come round the corner of the narrow country road we all see it at the same time. The castle stands a few hundred yards ahead of us on top of the hill. It looks amazing: a pale stone building topped with rusty red tiles silhouetted against a cloudless blue sky. The vineyards stretch in parallel lines right up to it, echoing the symmetry of its towers. A man-made creation in perfect harmony with its environment, the castle on the crest of the hill and the vineyards following the curving of the land. I am truly impressed by such a site but my kids are already going wild with imaginary swords and shields and their father is trying to control them. 

'Attack the castle!' One shouts.

'Yeah! Let's kill the traitors!' An other charming child of mine answers.

Soon we reach the grounds where there is so much space for our hyper-active kids that even their dad lets them off the leash. I go and purchase tickets for the whole family. It is not crowded and I do not have to queue. I am surprised to see that people around me are just as laid-back about the whole experience as we are. I wonder if they are all going to sample the wine afterwards.

Inside the castle, it is cool and wonderfully refreshing and of course our kids ask the stupid question about A/C having been invented by the chevaliers. Then they befriend an other bunch of siblings and start a game of lying down flat on the floorboards and peering down the cracks to spy on the other team who has gone down to the floor below. By now I pretend they are all belonging to the other set of parents and admire all the oil paintings and antique furniture as if my life depended on it. Thankfully the visit is a short one and all responsible parents manage to retrieve the right set of children from all the nooks and crannies. Then all the children are given huge ice-creams and told to sit in a neat quiet line on the low wall and the noisy bunch of parents heads for the bar. 

The bar tenders are all very young and look like students. Sure enough one introduces himself to us and says he is in his final year of a degree in oenology. I think that sounds so posh and so much better than a degree in wine. Briefly I wish I had known about such a choice of studies. I could have become a wine-drinking teacher! I'm sure I'd excel in this.

Our eldest child, Miss Organiser, soon joins us and listens attentively to the introductory lecture about he history of the place and the specificity of the soil which gives the wine its notes of bla bla bla ... Eventually he sets glasses in front of us and tells us we have to start with the dry wine.

'That's perfectly fine.' I say happily. 

He pours a little wine in our glasses with a lovely flourish of the wrist. My daughter gives him a tiny wave of the hand to show that she will not be drinking. We feel stupid for having failed to notice that this young - attractive - student in drinks was going to give alcohol to our underaged daughter. We forgive him quickly though as we sample the drink and nod appreciatively and discuss it between ourselves. Yes, we like it. And yes, it is a little dry. Our daughter is silently looking on. The cool student now asks if we are ready to sample an other wine, a little less dry this time, but not as sweet as the third one he will give us. He pours, we sample. We discuss, he nods. It is all going very smoothly. We can already form our opinion and voice our preferences.

'I much prefer the dry one, you know.'

'All right.' The young man says, adding:

'But please try this one too, even though it is the sweetest of our wines, and you might prefer the dry ones, it is a very interesting wine.'

And he pours us a glass.

'Oh yes!' I exclaim with enthusiasm. 'Definitely so much sweeter.'

'Yes.' My husband agrees. 'Drier is better.' 

'Yes, let me try it again.' And I take a sip of what I think is the first one. 

'Yes, this one. The really dry one.'

'No, mum!' My daughter pipes in. 'This one is the medium one.'

I am a little shocked and I turn to Mr Cool who nods.

'Yes, that one is medium-dry.'

My husband takes a swallow and nods. I grab an other glass and drink and say.

'Oh yes! This one is so sweet. But then which one is the dry one?' 

Suddenly it has all become very confusing, there seem to be so many glasses. 

'Mum! This one is the dry one.' Our daughter says, cool as a cucumber as she passes me the glass.

'Oh yes! That's dry. Let me try the really sweet one again to see the difference.' 

Our daughter pushes the glasses towards me, one by one. She is now getting impatient.

'That's very dry, the driest of the lot. This one is the sweetest and these ones are in between, that one being closer to dry. Honestly!'

I look towards Mr Cool who nods and looks at our daughter with a wide smile. He seems impressed. I am too. For good measure we take a last sample but truly I haven't got a clue about which one is dry or sweet or whatever wine it is supposed to be. Yet I cannot entrust my underaged daughter to pick the wines to buy!

'You know! I like them all. Let's get a complete selection!' 

While we go and pay I notice our daughter is giving Mr Wine-Student a look which says: 'Yeah! My parents are so embarrassing.' And it makes me feel old but also proud and happy at such a great cultural outing.

The château mentioned in this post is the Château de Monbazillac.