Excellent wine tour in Bordeaux

We (my wife and I and another couple) hired Alain Roux (dionysos.bordeaux@free.fr) to give us a full day tour of chateaux/wineries in Bordeaux in September of 2014. Alain met us at our cruise ship (the Seabourn Legend) at 9:30 a.m. with a mini-van, which comfortably seated all four of us plus Alain as driver and guide. Alain had organized the tour and, through a series of e-mails, gotten our preferences, level of experience and knowledge, and arranged for us to visit two chateaux in the morning, followed by lunch at a brasserie, followed by two more chateaux in the afternoon. He chose the four chateaux to represent different appellations and styles of wine. He had arranged our arrival times at each chateau and kept us on schedule with no pressure. The day was outstanding. We visited Chateau Haut-Brion (Premier Grand Cru), Chateau Castelneau, Chateau Soutard, and Chateau Beauregard. The brasserie he took us to was excellent – so good and so much that we cancelled our dinner reservations. Alain also took us for a brief driving tour of St. Emilion, which is charming. He was always willing to stop for photo opportunities, including a number of which he pointed out to us. He pointed out chateaux, churches, castles, and ruins as we drove along. He was very knowledgeable about Bordeaux in general and specific sights in particular. The four chateaux we visited each conducted its own tour; Alain accompanied us on some of these and not on others. He speaks very good English (and French with my wife who is fluent in French). He is very friendly and got along with us well. On the way back to our ship, there was a downpour, and Alain let us out at the bottom of the gangplank. He even arranged a beautiful, intense, full-arc double rainbow to cap off the day . Overall, Alain and the tour were excellent. Highly recommended, and we hope to hire him again when we return to Bordeaux.

Gee and here I thought it was our private wine guide ( Henri who owns Bordeaux Wine Travel) who arranged the double rainbow -- haha! But yes SoCal guy were were very lucky to get into Bordeaux for such a wonderful day. Hope you brought back on board as many great bottles of wine as we did. It was fun to share them at dinners with friends later during the cruise. One night we shared them at a small dinner the four of us enjoyed with the Hotel Manager Laurent, and the visiting Chef Pascal

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Chairsin,

Yes, we have great memories, but we only brought back three bottles of wine, which we did share with friends on board at dinner. Great times, wine, and memories.

Don

socalguy2010, my wife and I also had a private tour organized by Alain in April of this year and thought he was wonderful. He spoke English very well as you mentioned and has years of experience. Hopefully, someday we will take him up on his suggestion that we really should spend a week or two in Bordeaux.

I too highly recommend him.

Keith