Provence France – Wine Paradise

We headed to Provence after a few days in Nice and Monaco.  Again this is a very late post in that this trip was back in the Spring of 2012.  In an attempt to catch up on a lot of posts Im going to have to be light on the writing.  More details in the captions of pictures :).  So all I can say is that Provence was like Sonoma/Napa on steroids.  There just seemed to be so much more depth to the wine experience here in comparison.  There are a lot of different factors that played a role in this including the scenery, food quality, interactions with wineries, and just overall vibe.  Not to mention the wine is pretty outstanding as well!

We went in early June and we were very surprised to see that we were the early birds on the season.  A lot of times throughout the trip we felt like we were the only people in some of the towns we stopped in along our Cotes du Rhone driving tour.  This made the whole experience that much better.  For the driving tour I got my notes from my imaginary BFF Rick Steves’.  He definitely got it all right, so if you head this way I recommend using his book as a reference.

Our base camp was Domaine de Cabasse, which is an amazing place that I definitely recommend.  They recently came under new management and they have upgraded most of the rooms.  Plus the location is great… right on the vineyard that they produce their own label with.  Also it is walking distance (through the vineyard) to the town of Seguret, which we took advantage of.

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This is for my friend Luca… he needs to open at some point if he wants to sell pizza.
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10 Euros for Chateauneuf du Pape
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Great views from the hill town of Seguret
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A photo stop along our Cotes du Rhone driving tour.
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I was surprised Jess ordered this at a cool little restaurant called Les Coquelicots in the small town of Suzette. The prawns were grilled with an anise sauce… delicious.
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Open road
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Suzette France
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Great pool at our hotel.
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Totally unnecessary but awesome desserts at our hotel… Domaine de Cabasse. Jess’s Lemon Meringue was especially good.
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Great food at the hotel. We were one of two couples eating there that night.. so they had a lot of time to put on the extra flare..ha.
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Entrance to the hotel.. Domaine de Cabasse
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The wines we tasted all from Domaine de Cabasse. We loved 3 of them. Definite change up from the tastes of Sicilian wine. More subtle/depth and easy to drink.
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The view of Seguret from our hotel… fun walk along the vineyard. Try walking through the vineyards in Napa… you might get shot. ha.
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A stop in the town of Avignon France. We spent a few hours taking in the sights to check the culture/history box. Very impressive history with this city.
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Caveau de vin
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The baked goods! Atkins probably never went to Europe..
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This is one of my favorite things from the trip. In the town of Gigondas they have a wine tasting room in the middle of town. In this place you can select any wines from any of the wineries in the Gigondas area and taste it. The list of available wines to taste was over 300 different bottles from a full range of vintages. The kicker was that it was all free as well… as long as you would buy a bottle of something. I could have parked here for a week because the Gigondas wines were one of our favorites! The place is called Caveau de Gigondas.

2 Replies to “Provence France – Wine Paradise”

  1. Great post, hubs!

    I loved that trip! One of my favorites. The family that runs Domaine de Cabasse are so great, personable & they had excellent taste in interior design for both the hotel and the rooms – I wanted to steal the bathroom furnishings/decor there and put it in our future home…Nick, we need to start saving up! HA.

    I wish the NEX sold his wine too – it’s amazing!

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