I’m pausing updates for a few weeks as I spend some time in the Loire Valley, combining (as usual) some visits and tasting, a little R&R, and no doubt a little work on my house here. Well, at least that’s the idea.

I have some really interesting visits lined up. I confess I can be a little disorganised on my Loire trips, a contrast to my flying visits to Bordeaux which run on a military-grade timetable. Not this time though, as I started making visit requests a few weeks ago. Most vignerons have been very accommodating, although one or two said they would be too tired after the harvest. Fair enough.

Ironic (or is it, with a nod to the Morissette-detractors, merely annoying?), then, that all these well-laid plans might be scuppered by the French fuel blockade. A strike and refinery blockade has reduced supply of fuel to filling stations across the country. I came as well-prepared as I could, with a full tank and carrying the maximum extra fuel permitted on cross-channel ferries, but the situation here seems worse than it is being presented in the news, where I read maybe one-third of fuel stations had supply problems. None of my local filling stations have any fuel at all – perhaps I live in a ‘fuel supply blackspot’? Anyway, I have just under half a tank of fuel, easily enough for my visit in Chinon later today, but not enough to get to Anjou and back (it’s a small tank), which is where I am supposed to be going tomorrow. If I can’t find fuel today I will obviously have to cancel it.

So there will no new updates to Winedoctor for the next few weeks. I will of course throw the odd vineyard picture onto social media, so follow me there if you feel like keeping up with my visits, or indeed any episodes of running out of fuel at the roadside that may occur.