October 7 - Chateaux and Truffles

What a memorable experience today has been.  We were docked overnight in Tournus, which is in the south of Burgundy.

From the boat we were bused to a fabulous estate called Chateau de Cormatin. This is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful châteaux in Burgundy with, a Renaissance garden.

Originally a thirteenth century fortress stood on the bank of the river Grosne, to control the road leading to the abbey of Cluny. This medieval fortress disappeared three hundred years later when Antoine du Blé began building a chateau, in order to demonstrate his success at the end of the wars of religion.

The three residential wings were arranged in a horseshoe, anchored on the outer corners by four large projecting defensive pavilions. The fourth side was a rampart with a monumental entrance and drawbridge. The rampart was eliminated at the end of the seventeenth century, as a sign of allegiance to Louis XIV, the west wing was lowered after a fire in 1812 and the south wing collapsed in 1815 during its conversion into a textile factory. Luckily, the north wing remained intact. It was the last to be built by Jacques du Blé.

Moat around the Chateau de Cormatin

As an intimate of Marie de Medicis, he was inspired by the Luxembourg Palace, built at the same time for the queen.  The chateau was designed by the same architect that designed the Luxemburg Palace and Gardens in Paris.

The St.Cecilia study is the most opulent room in the château with its decorative panels edged in gold. Gold not only displayed the owner’s wealth, it also reflected light, especially important at night when the room was lit by the glow of the fire and candlelight.  The apartments have elegant wood panelling and very fine French style beamed ceilings.

Drawbridge into the Chateau's courtyard

In the 1980s, three brothers bought the derelict estate for about 400,000€. They were able to find the original plans in the Paris archives and they started restoring the chateau to its original state.  Since the 1980s they've been restoring the walls, the moat and the gardens.  They've been cleaning the interior works of art and repairing the furniture.  It is much more intimate than comparable chateaux, such as Versailles and Fontainebleau.

Chateau de Cormatin's garden

Chateau de Cormatin's garden

Main bedroom in the Chateau

Chinook looking for his  treats

We then went to a farm where they harvest truffles and produce saffron spice.  They star of the show was their dog, Chinook.  Chinook’s job is to sniff around the groove and find the truffles in the ground.  The dog loved all the attention he got from the people on the tour.  The farmer explained how truffles are grown.  The truffles rely on oak and hazelnut tree roots to grow and require sweet limestone soils and dry, hot weather that truffles need to grow to grow.  He must do a soil analysis every two years and has to adjust the PH levels accordingly. Black truffles go for $1,200/lb.

Because of their high price and their pungent aroma, truffles are used sparingly. Truffles are generally served raw, and shaved over pasta, salads, or fried eggs. White or black paper-thin truffle slices may be inserted into meats, under the skins of roasted fowl, in foie gras preparations, in pâtés, or in stuffings. Some speciality cheeses contain truffles, as well.

His wife explained how they produce saffron from orchids and told us that they sell this spice for $30,000 / kilo.  Their young son was there as it seems that each Wednesday afternoon, the schools close, but you must realize that the schools also open on Saturdays.  He was very outgoing and stole the show.  It seems he collects pins from the customers, but unfortunately we did not have any Canadian pins to give him.

The geography of southern Burgundy and northern Beaujolais is very spectacular.  Around the Saone River the area is flat and very green.  To the west you can see the Rhone Alps and they say on a clear day you can see Mt. Blanc in the Swiss Alps.  We are only a two hour drive from Geneva.

Scenic has a delightful device called the Scenic Tailormade.  It is a combination of GPS and audio travelogue.  As you sail down the river, this device plays commentaries of the various sites you can see along the shoreline.

Because there will be a lockmaster strike tomorrow, our captain decided to sail to Lyon today instead of stopping in Macon overnight.  This meant we got to sail into Lyon during the evening and experience sailing down the Saone and Rhone rivers under the city lights.  There was some fantastic modern architecture along the shore.  The most notable were two buildings that looked they had eye hole sockets in their front edifice.

Confluence Museum

Lizeo Online Media Building

Euronews HQ

One of the things that we noticed as we sailed down the Saone to Lyon was that there were very few houses along the shore.  The villages very rarely border the river and when they do, it is only for a short distance.  As we got closer to Lyon, there were more houses.

We had another superb dinner served tonight.  We both had Carrot and Ginger soup.  Our main course was Coq Au Vin.  I had a Gamy wine from Beaujolais and Marg had the Cabernet from Chateau Andrea.  I'm sure that we've both gained a few pounds this trip.