Getting to know the vine culture in Rhône-Alpes
The University where I am studying gave me such a great opportunity to visit vineyard in small village called Saint-Péray. Me and my coursmates were driven to this nice town where we firstly visited the church in which one nice gentelmen gave us little guide-tour. We weren't expecting that at all, but as he saw that we are tourists, he just came up to us and told that he was making construction for a statue and told a bit of history of paintings, arhictecture and other details of this church. It just proves that the french people are really helpful and ready to talk. Thankfuly I know some french and was helping my collegues to translate what our unexpected guide was talking about as it was obviously in french.
After our quick visit, we went to the grocery store to buy some food and drinks for our picnic that our professor added to our plan list before visiting vineyard. Firsly we went to boulangerie to buy traditional french baguette and apple tartines. After we went to lovely cheeseshop a.k.a. "fromagerie", where by the help of the working staff there, we came to choosing the best cheese and apple sider. With some effort and a bit of whining we climed the Crussol Castle, sat down and enjoyed the meal with beautiful view over the Saint-Péray and Valence.
The final and most important destination was the vineyard. We were taken to the vineyard by the two men who are working in tourism office. One of them give us a short tour and explained a lot about the needed soil for grapes, when is the harvest time (actually we had this excursion on the harvest time), the grape varieties and other information. The tour guide was very welcoming and happy to answer our questions. We were lucky to even have this tour as the other vineyards were closed for tourists because of the harvest time.
For more information about the possibility to visit wineyard, you can copy this site: http://www.rhone-crussol-tourisme.com/
Or more info about this specific wine appelation:
https://www.vins-rhone.com/vignobles/appellations/saint-peray
Later on we went to the wine shop which is also a vine cellar which we were unable to visit as it was busy time for the workers there. The shop assistant kindly explained us about the wine as we tasted it. Must I say, the taste differed so much from each wine that me and my coursmates tasted and it was strong and mild at the same time. Our lovely professor even bought us a gift, a bottle of white Saint-péray wine of the 2018. vintage.
Lovely day with perfect present!