Château Fourcas Dupré: Vineyards
Heading south on the Médoc on the D1215 (a less romantic but rather swifter route than the D2, the famed Route de Châteaux), the road passes straight through the centre of Le Fourcas, Le Tris and Listrac itself. It is a last gasp for the inner vineyards of the Médoc; there are vines on the southern side of the village only as far as Castelnau-de-Médoc, after which they give way once again to rough scrubland (more common than vines this far inland), fields full of solar panels, and eventually the suburbs of Bordeaux.
It is impossible to miss Château Fourcas Dupré. The buildings straddle the road as you enter Le Fourcas, the old cellars on the right proudly bearing the name of the estate for all to see. The vineyards are notable for sitting at an altitude 43 metres, the Médocian version of Mount Everest. I have heard that some locals feel light-headed as they drive through this hamlet, as they head north to their jobs in the vineyards of grand châteaux.
There are precisely 47.2 hectares of vines here, planted in a single parcel around the château. The soils are more complex than they are along the edge of the Gironde, where gravel rules. Here too there is gravel, which dominates accounting for 80% of the terrain, but there are also layers of clay and limestone. The vineyard is dominated by the classic red Bordeaux varieties, on 46 hectares, including 47% Cabernet Sauvignon, mainly on gravel, 47% Merlot, which favours the sandy clay or clay and limestone terroirs, although clearly some are also on gravel, 4% Cabernet Franc, also found mainly on the gravel, and finally 2% Petit Verdot, which tends to be restricted to the clay and limestone soils. The vines are planted at density of 8,300 pieds per hectare.
