The Wine Villages: Saint-Émilion, Bergerac and Sauternes

Editor's note

Two nights at Sainte-Terre on the Dordogne, about 9km from Saint-Émilion. The hermit Émilion's cave above the river grew into a town of pale limestone, and in the 11th and 12th centuries its monks cut the monolithic church out of the rock, the largest underground church in Europe; it is seen on a guided tour that also takes in the hermitage and the catacombs. Climb the Tour du Roy of 1237, from which the Jurade proclaims its judgement on the new wine, taste a grand cru at a château among the vineyards, and buy the macarons the town has made since 1620. The town and its vineyards have been UNESCO-listed since 1999.

Editor's note

Two nights at Pineuilh on the Dordogne, between the two. Michel de Montaigne withdrew in 1571 to the round tower of his château and wrote the Essays in its library until his death in 1592; the décor is unchanged and a Latin inscription records his retirement. The château burned in 1885 and was rebuilt, but the tower was spared. Three and a half kilometres away, the Gallo-Roman villa at Montcaret keeps the mosaics of its reception rooms and private baths. Downstream at Bergerac, wines of the hills are tasted at the Quai Cyrano in the 17th-century Cloître des Récollets, gabarres run on the river, and across it the Château de Monbazillac, built between 1550 and 1582, looks over the vineyards where noble rot makes the sweet wine.

Editor's note

One night at the municipal campsite by the river, a kilometre from the old town. La Réole was founded in 977 on a bluff above the Garonne and keeps one of the oldest town halls in France, built at the end of the 12th century or the start of the 13th and said to have been ordered by Richard the Lionheart. Above it stand the 18th-century buildings of the Benedictine priory and a priory church of the late 12th and early 13th centuries, and steep medieval lanes drop to the river. The towpath greenway along the Canal de Garonne is joined at Fontet.

Editor's note

One night at Le Nizan, a couple of kilometres from Bazas. The château of Roquetaillade puts an old castle with 10th-century remains beside a new one begun early in the 14th century for Gaillard de La Motte, nephew of Pope Clement V, with interiors decorated by Viollet-le-Duc; it was on the first list of historic monuments in 1840. Sauternes gives its name to the sweet wine made from grapes touched by noble rot on both banks of the Ciron, and its Château d'Yquem was the only premier cru supérieur in the 1855 classification. At Bazas, the cathedral of Saint-Jean-Baptiste keeps three mid-13th-century portals and has been UNESCO-listed on the Way of Saint James since 1998.