The Sancerre Wine Festival – a taste of France’s Loire Valley

In June this year, Julie and I explored the Loire Valley wine country, which stretches through central France from the Muscadet region on the Atlantic coast to the Sancerre and Pouilly-Fumé regions, southeast of the city of Orleans.  We based ourselves in the eastern Loire near the town of Sancerre, a medieval hilltop village overlooking the Loire River.  It’s at the epicenter of the production of Sancerre, our favorite white wine.

The Loire River runs through central France crossing through the Pays de la Loire and Centre-Val de Loire.  It is considered the garden of France due to the wealth of vineyards, orchards and crop fields, which blanket the landscape from the river’s edge.

A section of the region’s 300 square miles has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It was described by UNESCO as “an exceptional cultural landscape of great beauty comprised of historic cities and villages, great architectural monuments — the châteaux — and lands that have been cultivated and shaped by centuries of interaction between local populations and their physical environment, in particular the Loire River itself.”

There is much to see and do in the Loire Valley.  While the main attraction for most visitors is visiting the close to 300 amazing chateaus, which range from the hilltop Château d’Amboise to the over-the-top fairly-tale Château de Chambord, we were following the Sancerre wine trail.  Our path led us to the Sancerre Wine Fair, a two-day spring festival that showcases 200 vintners and more than 400 wines.

The all-day event features wine tasting, music, food, art, crafts and plenty of French joie de vivre – joy of life.  As if that wasn’t enough, the fair takes place in the atmospheric wine cellars of Les Caves de la Mignonne at the foot of the town.  At the fair each of the villages of the appellation have their stalls and a legion of winemakers offer tastings of the wines of Sancerre, Pouilly-Fumé, Menetou-Salon, Quincy, Reuilly, Coteaux-du-Giennois and Châteaumeillant.  The purchase of a 5€ (about $6) souvenir glass gains you admission to both days of tasting, learning and enjoying.

For information on the Sancerre Wine Fair and the wines of the Central-Loire Valley go to Vins-Centre-Loire.com.  For information on all that there is to do and see in Sancerre visit Tourisme-Sancerre.com.  And while you’re at it check out La Maison des Sancerre, which offers an interactive discovery of the Sancerre wine appellation, at Maison-Des-Sancerre.com.  To catch up on Julie and my visit to the area, as well as our recent explorations in Paris, Burgundy and Bordeaux, read the fall issue of our online magazine, listen to our podcasts and take a gander at our trip photos on Facebook, Istagram and Twitter.  If you want to watch our Rhone Valley and Bordeaux, France television shows go to Amazon.com.  If you want a DVD of our shows you can buy them on our website at travelscope.net.