The End of the Trip

We’re now home in the U.S. I had thought that my post at the end of the week in Ornans would be the last one for this trip, but we made a couple of unplanned stops on our last full day when we drove from Ornans to Cremieu, where we had started our vacation, so I thought I’d write something brief with some photos.  The first stop was the village of Nans-sous-Sainte-Anne, which we knew nothing about, but as we drove through it it looked charming, so we stopped and took a walk around the village. The village contains the source of the Lizon River, and there is a shop in the village run by a milk and cheese producer named after that: Le Laiterie de la Source du Lizon.  We made a brief stop there and picked up some of their cheese.

After leaving Nans-sous-Sainte-Anne we continued on towards Cremieu, driving through the Jura Departement. As we were driving through we saw a sign for the village of Chateau-Chalon, which is one of Les Plus Beaux Villages (Most Beautiful Villages) de France. We had visited there about 9 years ago when we stayed in that part of the Jura, and decided to make another stop, since we had plenty of time.  The village is high on a hill top, and not only does it have a Plus Beaux Village designation, but it has its own wine appellation, Chateau-Chalon, one of the appellations of the Jura region.

We then drove from Chateau-Chalon to Cremieu and checked into our AirBnB, where we had stayed last year. It’s a great place, and is right in the center of town. We took a walk around Cremieu and made another visit to the brew pub in town, Les Ursulines, which was bustling.  Before dinner we took another walk, and came upon a very friendly cat on a window sill. Unfortunately, the cat was in constant motion, and we couldn’t get any pictures that were in focus. We then went to dinner at Le Castor Gourmand, a restaurant that we had passed by many times but never ate at.  The meal was fantastic, with an excellent, but not pricey, wine list, and entertainment was provided by neighborhood cats who paraded by the window next to our table, presumably dining at the 4 little plates of food we had seen laid out for them next to the restaurant.

Cremieu at Night

On Sunday morning, after breakfast we took a short walk to our favorite boulangerie in Cremieu and picked up some things for the trip home and for the next day’s breakfast. We then made the short drive to the Lyon airport to return our car and begin the journey home. It was uneventful, but long. By the time we finally arrived home it was 10 p.m. here, or 4 a.m. French time.

Arriving in France

We began our trip to France exactly the same way we began last year’s visit. We flew on Lufthansa from Boston to Lyon with a change in Munich, picked up a car at the Lyon airport, and made the short drive from the airport to Cremieu. Cremieu is a small town that we fell in love with the first time we stayed there a few years ago, and this was our third visit.  We parked near the center of town, and spent the afternoon walking through the town, going up to the medieval chateau, walking around the old walls, and passing by the former convent buildings. The brewery Les Ursulines, named after the nearby former Ursulines convent, opened at 4 p.m., and, following our tradition, we stopped to have a beer in their courtyard.

We had booked our hotel for the first night back in the Fall, and wanted to stay at Auberge de la Chaite, where we had stayed on our two previous trips. When I made my reservation, I discovered that the hotel had been sold by the family that had run it for over 30 years. It was a charming place with just 9 rooms, and a great restaurant serving classic French country cooking, with the chef being one of the owners. It was now called Hotel Le Baron, and was being run by a young man and his partner. Based on what I could see from the web site, the decor had been changed somewhat, and the menu was totally different. However, we decided to give it a chance. The rooms were still quite nice, albeit furnished differently, and the decor of the common areas and the restaurant was very different.  As for the restaurant, the meal was enjoyable, but in our opinion it didn’t compare to the meals we had had at Auberge de la Chaite.

Friday morning, before leaving Cremieu we stopped at Les Saveurs Paysans, a small food shop that carries products from local producers.  We bought several goat cheeses from a nearby farm, strawberries that had just come into season, walnut oil from a local mill, and some sparkling wine from a Bugey producer.  We then headed out to visit some wine producers in the Maconnais on our way to visit our friend Ghislaine in Burgundy.

The Maconnais wine region is a little south of the famous wine appellations of Burgundy in the Cote d’Or. The wines from Maconnais are almost all white, and, like the white wines from the rest of Burgundy, are almost all 100% Chardonnay. And speaking of Chardonnay, in the middle of the day we stopped in the village of Chardonnay, which proudly proclaims that it gave its name to the Chardonnay grape.  Also, the village of Chardonnay, like many villages we drove through, can append its name to Macon as an appellation. Among the appellations whose wines we tried on this excursion through the Maconnais, or whose vineyards we passed through, were Macon-La Roche Vineuse, Macon-Uchizy, Macon-Bellait, and Macon-Ige. We visited 3 wineries, 2 of which we had stopped at previously – Chateau de la Greffiere in La Roche Vineuse; Domaine Talmard/Mallory et Benjamin in Uchizy; and Domaine Corsin in Davaye, principally a producer of Pouilly-Fuisse. The Maconnais produces excellent wines that are an affordable alternative to the more prestigious appellations of the Cote d’Or.

After leaving Domaine Talmard we headed towards Gueugnon, where Ghislaine lives. We had stayed there several times, and were familiar with the route.  We arrived there mid-afternoon, and after spending a little time with Ghislaine, Ann and I took a walk into the center of Gueugnon while Ghislaine started dinner. She had a dance class that night, so we had an early dinner before she left.

The next day Ghislaine drove us to several sights in southern Burgundy. We made a brief stop at a medieval chateau in the village of Chassy. Besides the medieval part of the chateau, there was a tower that was clearly modern, but fit in well with the rest of the chateau; it appeared to be a vacation rental property through Gites de France. After Chassy, Ghislaine drove us towards the village of Uchon, where we took a walk through the hills and admired the views, as well as the numerous huge rocks, known as Les Rochers du Carnaval, that proliferated there. Afterwards we stopped at an auberge in Uchon and had lunch outside.  After lunch we went to Mont Dardon, a viewing area high above the valley with outstanding views in all directions, and took a walk around the park. Afterwards Ghisliane drove to a goat cheese producer she had visited once before, but Friday was their closing day.

Chateau de Chassy

Rocks of Carnaval

Hazy View From Mont Dardon

We then returned to Guegnon, and Ann and I took a walk to the center of town to pick up some provisions for the evening.  Ghislaine’s 3 children, their spouses, and their 4 children were coming to dinner that night, and Ghislaine was making Raclette, along with accompaniments such as potatoes and charcuterie.  Ann and I were supplying the wine, as well as dessert. We had hoped to get a gateau (a cake), but all of the bakeries had sold out, so we got a few dozen macarons. It was a very enjoyable evening, and everyone liked the raclette and the macarons. When they weren’t eating, the children spent most of their time running around the house playing games with each other.

The next day was a whirlwind tour of goat cheese producers, small villages, and visits to Ghislaine’s parents and several long-time friends of hers. Our first task was to find a particular goat cheese producer, but on the route we spotted a sign for La Ferme de Bellevue, a farm that had goat cheese and chickens. We stopped there, and while they were out of chickens and eggs, they had plenty of goat cheese. So we stocked up there, and then headed for the other farm, La Ferme des Biens Vivants. It was a beautiful place, and after buying several goat cheeses, we went to the barn to see the goats. There was a young woman there feeding the goats, and she talked to us a little about their operation, which had over 150 goats.

Figurines at La Ferme de Bellevue 

Real goats at La Ferme des Biens Vivants

After leaving the second farm we headed towards Ghislaine’s parents’ house, first making a few brief stops along the way, including this beautiful church in the countryside.

When we arrived at Ghislaine’s parents, her mother had made lunch for us. It was an enormous meal, and included cauliflower gratin and a roast pheasant that a friend of theirs had hunted. It was a real treat, as pheasant is not something you often find in the U.S.

After lunch we drove through the countryside and made a couple of stops, the first of which was Le Moulin d’Angoin, an old restored water mill that appeared to be a residence. The next stop was the town of Saint-Gengoux-le-National, a medieval town with some beautiful old buildings, and a couple of non-Medieval cats.

Moulin d'Angoin

Saint-Gengoux

We then finished the day by visiting two couples who are longtime friends of Ghislaine, all of whom we had met previously. We shared a bottle of wine from the Maconnais, a Vire-Clesse, that the friend at whose house we all met brought up from his cave.  When we left he gave us a bottle of sweet Coteaux de Layon that he had picked up in the Loire, and we had that after dinner at Ghislaine’s house.  This was our last night in Gueugnon; the next day we were heading a little bit north in Burgundy to the village of Chateauneuf-en-Auxois.

Finishing Up In Cremieu, Part 2

  Like last year, we finished our trip in the town of Cremieu, not far from the Lyon airport.  We left our gite in Beaucroissant on Saturday morning, and made a couple of stops on the way to Cremieu, which is only about an hour from Beaucroissant as the crow flies, although it took us a lot longer since we're not crows..

   Our first stop was in Saint Chef, a small town with some remarkable buildings, including a beautiful church dating from the 10th century, which in this case was open to visitors.

      We had a picnic near the center of Saint Chef, and then continued our drive. This weekend was the Isere's equivalent of the Ferme en Ferme event that we went to last weekend when leaving the Rhone area.  There was a goat cheese producer on the outskirts of Cremieu, La Chevre "Ry," that we planned to visit, and on the way we stopped to get a view of a chateau.  La Chevre "Ry" is presumably a play on the word "chevrerie," which means a farm that makes goat cheese.  We stopped to visit the farm, and the goats, and bought several of their cheeses before heading towards our hotel in Cremieu.

     For our last night we stayed at the same hotel as we did on the last night of our trip in 2017 -- Auberge de la Chaite. It's a wonderful small, old hotel with a great restaurant. After checking in we walked all over Cremieu again, stopping at the brewery Les Ursilines for a beer in their outdoor courtyard.  It was a beautiful afternoon, so we took several pictures of the chateau ruin high above the town and the former medieval priory that we had visited at the beginning of our trip. We also spied a cat that was curious but safely out of reach.

     In the evening we had dinner at the Auberge, which was just as outstanding as it was last year.  The difference was that last year it was chilly and we sat in the main dining room near the fireplace, whereas this year it was warm and we sat on the outdoor terrace. The food was outstanding, and the restaurant has an excellent selection of local wines, including several producers we had visited last year.  We had a glass of sparkling wine from the Caveau Bugiste in the Bugey region, and a bottle of Altesse (Roussette grape) "Marestel" from Domaine Dupasquier in the Savoie.  After dinner we took one last stroll around Cremieu.

     On Sunday morning we had breakfast at the Auberge, then took a short walk to the great bakery we had visited several times this year and last, and picked up some croissants to bring home.  We then drove to the Lyon airport for our journey to Boston, which, with a connection in Munich, seemed to take forever.  We arrived home late last night via the bus from Boston, having been awake almost 24 hours.

On To The Isere

After leaving our chambre d’hote in Sainte-Croix-en-Jarez on Saturday morning, our first stop on the Ferme en Ferme circuit was right in the village, at La Ferme du Moulin des Chartreux. The farm is located just outside the walls of the old monastery, and raises several kinds of animals for meat and for cheese.  After looking around the farm, we bought several goat cheeses, a meat tourte, and a fresh pintade (guinea hen) for roasting, complete with the head.  One of the owners took some pictures of us at their stand, and asked for my email address. Two days later I got an email from her with the two photos.

Pintade Before Being Roasted

We then drove out of Sainte-Croix towards the village of Pelussin, where we found Le Potager d’Olivier, a small organic farm growing a number of kinds of vegetables, as well as mushrooms in their darkened cave.  We were given a tour of some of the vegetable plots, and shown the mushroom growing operation. They had several of their vegetables for sale, and since we needed some food items for the coming week, we picked up some things, including the first asparagus of the season.

After leaving Pelussin, we headed up towards the village of Chavannay, high above the Rhone River. We saw signs for numerous Northern Rhone wine producers, some of whom I was familiar with, but the only one that was participating in Ferme en Ferme was Vignobles Verzier. We stopped there, and were given a tasting by one of the winemakers. The wines were superb, and we bought several bottles, including a Condrieu (a white made entirely from Viognier), a Saint Joseph blanc (a Marsanne/Roussane blend), and a Saint Joseph rouge (all Syrah).

We then crossed the Rhone and headed towards Beaucroissant in the Isere departement, where we were going to be spending the next week at a gite (basically a restored farmhouse), with a stop in Chatte to check out two shops we had read about. One of them is a cooperative of local farmers, including vegetable, meat and cheese producers; the other is the retail store of the adjacent factory that makes raviolis that are a local specialty called Raviolis de Royans.  We bought a number of items at each store, the continued on to Beaucroissant.

We arrived in Beaucroissant in the late afternoon, and were greeted by the woman who runs the gite with her husband. They live next door to the gite, and the woman told us that the property was originally owned by her grandparents, and that she grew up in what is now the gite. She also told us that we were the first Americans to stay in the gite. A chance encounter later that afternoon made us wonder whether we were in fact the first Americans to have stayed anywhere in Beaucroissant. While we were walking back from the center of the village we met a man who was walking his very friendly dog. As he started to walk away he asked us where we were from. When we said “the United States,” he was taken aback, and said, in English, “the United States, and you’re staying in Beaucroissant? Why, do you have family here?” We told him no, we were just on vacation. He seemed surprised that a couple of Americans would be spending a week of their vacation in Beaucroissant.

That night we roasted the pintade we had bought earlier in the day at the farm in Sainte-Croix-en-Jarez, and drank the Ladoix red Burgundy we had bought on our excursion to the Cote d’Or last Tuesday.  With the pintade we had the asparagus from the vegetable farm we had visited that morning, and some of the potatoes from Ghislaine’s father.

On Sunday morning we drove to Morestel, about 45 minutes from here, for their weekly outdoor market.  It’s one of the largest and best markets in this part of France, and we had gone there last year when we stayed in the Bugey region. We had planned to just get a few things there, since we had quite a lot of food already, but everything looked so good that we wound up getting far too much.  We spent a fair amount of time walking through the market and throughout the center of town, and then drove back to Beaucroissant for lunch, which consisted of cheese (we have a lot of that) plus some olives and tapenade we had picked up in Morestel.

Fishmonger in Moretsel

In the late afternoon we took a short drive to the village of Virieu to visit the Chateau de Vireu. The chateau was originally a fortification built around the 12th century, and was later added on to in several stages and renovated about 100 years ago. Part of it now houses five families descended from the Virieu family line. An interesting part of the tour concerned the role that the Virieu family played in the French Resistance during World War II, including their efforts at hiding some families, including Jewish families, which earned them a commemorative award from Israel.

Chateau de Virieu

That night our dinner included a Saucisse Lyonnaise, a specialty of the nearby city of Lyon, which we had picked up in Morestel.  For the wine, I opened the Saint Joseph rouge from Vignoble Verzier, which was a great match for the sausage; not surprising, since Lyon and the St. Joseph wine region are so close.

Monday morning we headed off to the Savoie departement to visit some wineries. The first one was Domaine Grisard in Freterive, which we had visited last year and a couple of years before that.  We’ve both become big fans of Savoie wines, which can be difficult to find in the United States. One thing that’s interesting about Savoie wines is the number of indigenous grapes grown here, many of which are not grown anywhere else, and some of which had almost become extinct before being revived by some grape growers in the area.  Domaine Grisard has been a pioneer in keeping some of the ancient varieties alive, and they are also a pepiniste (fruit tree seller), selling grape vines to other vineyards.  We tried a number of their wines, and bought several of them.

After leaving Domaine Grisard we stopped at Domaine Philippe Grisard, another branch of the family.  We were given a spectacular tasting by Philippe himself, who poured us about a dozen different wines, including 4 or 5 different red Mondeuse Noire wines, and wines from the rare Mondeuse Blanche and Persan grape varieties. We had hoped to keep our purchases to a reasonable number, and had planned to visit a third winery afterward (down from the 5 I had originally planned to visit in this area), but the wines here were so good we bought 9 bottles (plus we were given 1 by Philippe), and cancelled our next planned visit.  Instead, we went to lunch at a restaurant on a small lake, La Carouge, which had been recommended to me by the wine writer Wink Lorch.  After lunch we took a walk around the lake, which has great views of the surrounding mountains.

Tasting Room at Domaine Philippe Grisard

Lac Carouge

On our drive back to Beaucroissant we took a route through the mountainous Chartreuse Park, rather than taking the fast autoroute that we had driven on in the morning. We passed through some charming villages and had some great views of the hills. We made one brief stop in Saint Laurent du Pont and took a stroll through the town. We then drove through the congested town of Voiron during rush hour, and eventually returned to Beaucroissant for aperitifs and then dinner.

Saint Laurent du Pont

Beginning in Cremieu

 My last post from last year's trip was titled "Finishing Up in Cremieu." Now we're back in Cremieu, having flown in to Lyon yesterday and driven right to Cremieu.  When we left home the weather had been not-so-springlike, with temperatures in the 40's. When we arrived in Cremieu, it was sunny, in the mid-70's, and flowers were blooming everywhere.

    During last year's visit we spent our time in the center of town, and took some pictures of the medieval structures in the hills above town, including this photo of the 12th Century Priory of St. Hippolyte.


  Yesterday, since the weather was so beautiful, we took a walk up to the abandoned priory, which is in the process of being restored. We had some great views of the town below and the chateau and convent.

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  After walking back down from Saint Hippolyte, we stopped at Les Ursulines, a brewery outside the Ursuline Convent that we had visited last year. We sat and had a beer in their courtyard, then headed back to the place we were staying and had dinner at a table in the garden.

  Friday morning we made a couple of stops in Cremieu to pick up some pastries and cheese, and then headed to Gueugnon in Burgundy, where we were going to spend 5 nights with a friend. On the way, we stopped at 2 wineries in the Maconnais and picked up a dozen bottles of wine. We're now in Gueugnon at our friend's place, having gone out for a long walk with her and her dog and having dinner at her house. And if anyone still thinks that the French don't like Americans (probably not anyone reading this blog), they should know that we're staying at 2 Impasse (dead end) John Kennedy, which is off Rue John Kennedy.