Travels in Burgundy 1999

Travels in Burgundy

MORE ADVENTURES IN BURGUNDY

Dixie's Map of the Burgundy Region
January 1999

As in previous years, I arrived in Burgundy on a Sunday. This year it was the last Sunday of the hunting season, and as I drove along the autoroute I saw clumps of men with guns in the countryside. Then, to confirm this, as I climbed up a series of hairpin bends on the way to my hotel, I passed a makeshift wooden sign propped up on the roadside that said:

LA CHASSE
ATTENTION AUX CHIENS
MERCI

To add a bit of colour, I thought this time I would mention in passing the hotels where I stayed. So, to the first one, in a small village perched high above and to the west of Dijon, with a panoramic view across the city. It was also the village inn. It was very cheap, very clean and perfectly comfortable. The supper was nothing special, but entirely edible, and considering it cost 65 francs (for four courses and half a bottle of wine), who's complaining? There was only one small drawback: the church, or rather its bell. It clearly had a mission to announce the time every half hour to the whole of Dijon - one of those bells that after each clang leaves an intense, actually quite musical, reverberation. For some reason every hour it struck the hour twice. I was tired that evening and went to bed straight after supper. In fact, I was so tired I couldn't quite get to sleep. Ten o'clock was twenty clangs. I was dreading midnight. I heard every one of the twenty-four clangs. Then I fell asleep - I never heard one o'clock.

Another break with previous years: to make the thing more digestible I will only deal with a selection of the growers from whom I bought this time.