Bordeaux 2021 at Two Years: Pessac-Léognan, Red
There is a knack to getting around the vineyards of Bordeaux by car. And I don’t think there is any way to learn it but the hard way.
Take, for example, the route between Château Montrose and Château Cos d’Estournel, a relatively simple drive which takes no more than five minutes, and yet it harbours one of the most dangerous obstacles to any aspiring Bordeaux critic. Take the level crossing just past Château Le Crock too fast and you run the risk of your hire car being launched into space. Of course, whether you achieve that also depends on whether your speed exceeds the escape velocity for your particular model of hire car; for details of the escape velocity for a current-model Renault Twingo, do get in touch.
And then there is the issue of traversing Pauillac. It took me a while to realise that as half my Pauillac appointments were at châteaux north of the town, and half at châteaux to the south, that it would be better to divide my appointments into two groups, and visit one lot in the morning, the others in the afternoon. This saves crossing the town multiple times each day; it only takes ten minutes, but do it six times and that’s an hour of tasting time wasted. It also avoids a multitude of temptations, not least the multiple bars and restaurants situated along the waterfront, one or two of which have really upped their game in recent years (I speak from experience).
Coming back to the report at hand, heading from my accommodation to the first appointment of the day at Château Les Carmes Haut-Brion, yet another property I now visit regularly, brought another new challenge, as I negotiated my way through the urban streets of Bordeaux at rush hour. I thought the one-way system around St Emilion was inconvenient, but it has nothing on the Bordeaux suburbs of Pessac and Talence. Happily, the local council do not seem to have invested heavily in traffic cameras, and after battling a legion of no-entry and delivery-access-only signs, followed by the inadvertent use of a bus lane, I arrived at what is surely Bordeaux’s most urban vineyard.
