Damn it! Last day of the cruise. This sucks. The weather echoed my mood because it was rainy and cold. Most of the cruise guests were doing walking trips in the town of Bordeaux but Chef Todd and Winemaker Anna had managed to finagle tastings at two of the classified wineries in Medoc, Chateau Kirwan and Chateau Lynch-Bage. The classification system of wineries goes back to 1855 where the well known wineries were rated into five different classes. There has only been one change to the wineries listed as Premiers Crus (First Growth or top wineries) when the Rothschild family decided to throw a little money around and got theirs listed in 1973. The lower the number in the listing, the better the wine was perceived to be in 1855. Granted, that doesn’t guarantee its quality now, but most have maintained a high quality standard.

Todd got us into Chateau Kirwan, a third growth winery because he carries their wine in his restaurant. I guess I expected a large, slightly stuffy winery due to its reputation for having really good wines. Nothing could have been further from the truth. The winery has been in the same family for three generations, with a fourth well on the way to getting into the business.

We were met by Natalie Schyler, one of the third generation owners. Natalie was probably the most gracious host we’ve ever had at a winery – very friendly, down to earth and was genuinely enthused to show their facility and explain the technology they were embracing at their facility, while keeping the history and family traditions intact.

After the tour, we sat down to a four course meal and wine pairing hosted by Natalie. Karen and I are not complete idiots so we sat down at the table with her so we could continue to hear about the family and the operation. Like virtually every meal on this trip, it was outstanding. The last wine of the meal was a 1996 Magnum of their Bordeaux and it was the best wine we had on the cruise. She reinforced what I’ve always suspected – that wine ages better in larger format bottles because there is less oxygen in the bottle relative to the volume of the wine so it ages more gracefully. I wish more US wineries would embrace magnums for aging wine. In theory, it should be cheaper because there is less handling for the same amount of wine, only a single cork and less glass. Unfortunately, theory doesn’t lead to reality as many magnums from smaller wineries are more than the price of two bottles which carry the same amount of wine in total. I suspect that magnums are uncommon enough that they don’t really fit in standard processing. As a parting gift, she gave each member of the tour a bottle of one of their blends which was quite nice. As part of the earlier wine tasting, we tried one that was two years younger and it was quite drinkable then but should be even better in a year or two so we’ll lay our two bottles down for special occasions. I don’t know if Chateau Kirwan is open to the public generally but if it is and you are in Bordeaux, this is a must visit.

Our last winery of the trip was Chateau Lynch- Bage, a fifth growth winery.

Quick side note by the way.  You may have noticed the decidedly “un-French” names like Lynch and Kirwan. In the 18th and 19th century, a number of Irish and English men bought Chateaus in Bordeaux and named them after themselves. Several generations later, the family is very French and all that’s left of the Anglos who bought the wineries are the names. Château Lynch-Bage has a reputation for big wines and it’s well deserved. The wines we tasted were big with very heavy tannins. I like tannins in wines but these were extremely tannic. One of our fellow cruisers, Barry who has managed to collect a pretty impressive knowledge of wine said, “This is just a baby. It needs to grow quite a bit”. I wouldn’t drink them for at least 10 years and unfortunately, we don’t have the storage capacity to hold wines for 10 years so we didn’t buy any wines from Chateau Lynch-Bage.  They also have a very cool museum upstairs, preserving much of their wine making equipment from the 1800’s.

Our guide at Lynch-Bages was a character.  Not only did she know their wine making processes inside and out, but she also did impersonations of wine grapes.  Yep…that’s what I said…wine grape impersonations.  As she is describing the wine making process, she is using various voices to describe the characteristics of the various grapes.  At first, we all looked at each other, thinking, “Is this person nuts?”  However, it did lend some humor to what can sometimes be a dry discussion about the nuts and bolts of wine making, especially when you’ve already heard the process five times previously on just this trip.

We wanted to thank both Chateau Kirwan and Chateau Lynch-Bages for taking the time to host us because the next week, En Primeur was taking place.  It’s a gathering in Bordeaux of wine buyers and sommeliers from all over the world to rate and buy wine futures.  Natalie said it’s five days of stress and nonstop work and hosting so for each of them to take the time to welcome us really shows the genial nature of even the bigger wineries.

Back to the boat for a hasty packing, unpacking, repacking and then carefully considered wedging of the remaining articles into any nook or cranny we could find with only a mild amount of cursing. We only packed two bags between us, one carry-on size and the other, significantly bigger but still not the biggest one that we have. It didn’t leave room for many souvenirs which is just as well because we’d probably need to buy a bigger house if we accumulate much more stuff.

All in all, we had a pretty uneventful trip home. A one day stop over in London gave us the opportunity to see our friends Garry and Jackie and of course London doesn’t really speak wine but there are good beers and more good pubs that you could visit in a lifetime so it made for a nice evening.

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