Saint-Emilion

When we planned the trip, my friends and I already expected that our visit to Saint Emilion must be not enjoyable because visiting in March, there is almost nothing in the vineyards, and because two of our group don’t drink alcohol, and one has to be a driver, so visiting chateaux for wine testing for just one person in the group seem to be pointless. Anyway, we still kept Saint Emilion in our plan expecting good weather and great view from this medieval town; however, when we arrived the town, there was shower, and it was really cold. We decided to look around the town which was quite prosperous and lovely but really quiet as all the shops were closed and no one came out in such bad weather. My friends also angrily cursed the expensive parking fee so that we decided to park our car outside the town.

We roamed around the wet and quiet town, luckily that the town was great. Many buildings were beautiful, and many small alleys were really pretty with flower and ivy. We saw the famous Monolithic Church, which was interesting and the Tour du Roy, an old tower, a really nice place for photograph where we could get a perfect view of the whole town. We went to a recommended spot to see the view of countless tiled roof which was really nice indeed. During our visit the only shop that still opened were the wine shops. When we looked …

I visited this WHS in March 2014. It is a short drive from Bordeaux and easily accessible from the highway or else through very good but small roads meandering through the surrounding viticulture landscape. Unfortunately at this time of year the vines were dormant so no grapes or green leaves were to be seen. Yet the never-ending stretches of monoculture fields dedicated to wine-making can be appreciated as well as a couple of stops to some of the great Saint-Emilion wineries. Wine-tasting is a must in this region as a whole but St. Emilion is a special place for wine connoisseurs where you can feast your taste-buds with the red St. Emilion Grand Cru wine directly from the Chateau cellars. The medieval town of St. Emilion has a unique landmark - Europe's largest monolithic church - this rock-hewn church deserves a visit. Nearby, there are two magnificent cloisters. One in the Collegiate Church and another in the Cordeliers Wine Bar. However, the highlight of my visit was wandering around the narrow cobblestoned streets and enjoying the typical St. Emilion macarons from the tiny shops scattered throughout the town. To me this WHS does not offer much in terms of OUV especially when compared to other inscribed sites of such as Vezelay, Reims, the Route of Santiago de Compostela in France or other medieval towns in Europe.

St. Emilion is one of France's most famous wine-growing towns, and the centre of the Bordeaux appellation. Coming by train from Bordeaux, you can see the vineyards stretching as far as the eye can see. The station is about a 20-minute walk from the village. Apart from countless wineries and wine shops, St. Emilion has many interesting historic features, including the unique Monolithic Church, which is almost totally underground. It can only be visited on a guided tour, though (the guide said that only 20% of visitors to the village take a tour of its most famous sight; the other 80% just come for the wine). A good way to explore the surrounding vineyards and chateaux is the small tourist train, whch also gives some useful historic infos. St. Emilion is also located along the Way of St. James, but doesn't seem to be included in the WH site (even though many other French WH sites are).

We visited Saint-Emillion on a day trip from Bordeaux. Trains leave only about 5 times a day, and we found that the 10.40 departure suited us best. The train takes just over half an hour. From the tiny railway station in Saint-Emillion a walk of about 20 minutes is required to get to the city center. This walk actually provided us with our first photo opportunities of the famous vineyards, so it was no hassle at all.

The town of Saint-Emilion likes its tourist Euro, so almost every building in the old city center is converted into a shop, a wine bar, or a restaurant. Most visitors seem to come there on bus tours or by their own car. The medieval streets are bustling with people, and as we were blessed by extremely sunny and warm weather for this time of year the terraces were crowded. We enjoyed a great meal of mussels and french fries there – such pleasures is what a mini-break is all about.

The two major monuments of Saint-Emilion are its churches: the weird Monolithic Church and the exuberant Collegiate Church. The latter has lots of colourful stained glass windows, through which the sunlight shines to illuminate the interior.

We visited the surrounding vineyard landscape by the little tourist train that loops through it. The fields were pretty dry already, so I was not as impressed by the scenery as I was 8 weeks ago when I visited the Lavaux vineyard terraces in …

I really enjoyed this visit, I spent a couple of hours aimless wandering the hilly cobbled streets in the centre of the medieval town, poking my head into the smattering of interesting buildings in the centre. Perhaps I enjoyed it so much because a few hours before-hand I had been in London; therefore making my bucolic picnic, next to the gentle trickle of a fountain seem even more relaxing.

I then headed off to explore a few of the chateau in the surrounding fields. I loved just aimlessly driving through the twisting lanes between the almost endless vineyards. Virtually the entirety of the jurisdiction is planted with vines making this one of the most intense grape growing regions in one of Frances main wine regions. St Emilion AOC is located in the wider Bordeaux wine region, and is famous for producing high quality red wines mostly based on the Merlot, Cabernet France and Cabernet Sauvignon grape variety. St Emilion AOC itself is broken down into several classifications itself, with two estates being awarded the highest accolade Premier grand cru classé A. I made it a bit of a mission to hunt out these two super vineyards. The first, Château Ausone, was pretty simple as it is right next to the town of St Emilion. I then drove on to Château Cheval Blanc knowing that the vineyards next to the road produce some of the most expensive bottles of wine in the world. The intense classification system takes into account the …

Reaching St Emilion is possible by bus or train from Libourne. I travelled by train to a station 2km south, downhill from the town. The road to the town was lined each side with huge vinyards. After passing through the Porte Bouqueyre it was easy to realise this was a special place. Besides all the caveaux for wine tasting there were several interesting buildings like the monolithic church, the Kings Tower and the Collegiate church.

I continued to the top end of the village where the buses stop. From here there were extensive views of the vinyards all around.

In our trip to France we have been to the beautiful village of Saint-Émilion, the biggest of the jurisdiction, that is 7846 ha big, includes eight communes and is situated on the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela; its boundaries were established during the English rule, in the 12th century, by John Lackland, king of England, and coincide also with the Barbanne, a tributary of the Isle, and the Dordogne. The relief has a stratum of limestone defined by shelves that crisscross the landscape. This disappears to the north, along with the sandstone that it overlies, and is replaced by a mixture of clayey sands and gravels, dipping towards the south. There are two slopes: one is gentle and cut by valleys, the other steeply plunging in the Dordogne valley and forming also concave valleys, in one of which is Saint-Émilion. The climate is suitable for the viticulture (the jurisdiction is famous for this), that was introduced by the Romans and intensified in the Middle Age, so the landscape has a monoculture of vineyards, that occupy 5400 ha (the 67,5 % of the area). The small village of Saint-Émilion, situated on two limestone hills, has nice squares and stone houses in small groups especially of the first half of the 19th century, that have no more that two storeys and that were used for the vineyards workers. The large rectangular wine storehouses are made of stone or a mixture of brick and stone with tiled double-pitched roofs; they began to …

The “Jurisdiction of St-Emilion” is in effect what is called a “cultural landscape” in other WHS inscriptions. It is a historic landscape which has been developed over many centuries for the production of wine.

We found this an interesting concept and one which is important enough within French history and culture to justify its inscription. Though how “unique” the “Jurisdiction” is among French wine growing areas I don’t know – but they did get in first! This mediaeval status, granted in the 12th century and still pursued with accompanying traditional rites, has been used as a significant reason under criterion iv for choosing St-Emelion – as long as France doesn’t start inscribing wine regions as frequently as it inscribes religious buildings! You think I joke? In fact France already has 2 more wine growing areas as sites on its Tentative List – Vignoble Champenois and Cotes de Nuits de Beaune. Other countries have their claims too - Hungary has already had its Tokaji Wine Region Cultural Landscape inscribed and Spain has a “Cultural Route of the Vine" in its tentative list!

St-Emilion itself is very pleasant and very “French” medieval town with ramparts, narrow streets, Chateau and Market Place . The “shopping opportunities” are exploited to the full and at times you feel that you are walking through an enormous outdoor “wine hypermarket”! The little Museum of Viticulture supports this selling effort but is interesting enough – I particularly remember an enormous wall sized map showing every field in the …