Bordeaux walking tour & Cité du Vin

OK...our first full day in Bordeaux and we had a lot planned!

(Just a little sidebar here...please excuse any typos...writing with 5 "distractions" around me is a bit of a challenge! 😂)

Months ago, I arranged for a "private" walking tour for our family group of 6.  Wasn't it a surprise to have 8 other people join us!  Another way to look at it is: "weren't they lucky to have 6 Hunts join them"?!?!  We met our 8 new "friends",  plus our guide at 10am at the big Monument aux Girondins.  Our guide, Adrian, was fantastic; a young man with a Mexican father and French/Lebanese mother.  He speaks French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese,  English, German, and some Arabic...he was funny and charming, and he really knew his stuff!  He moved at the age of 6 from Mexico to Bordeaux and LOVES his city!  We moved quickly, and covered a lot of ground in our 2 hour tour.  Our first fun fact was about the origin of the name of this city: "bord" means "border", and "eau" means water...put them together and you get a city at the border of the water...BORDEAUX!

Some of the things we saw were the Monument aux Girondins, the Opera Theater where we paused to learn a bit about Bordelaise architecture which was created by Baron Haussmann who later went on to redesign the city of Paris.  Bordeaux is often referred to as a "small Paris", however Adrian insisted that Paris is just a "big" Bordeaux...so many of the things we think of as emblematic of Paris actually started in Bordeaux which was originally planned to be the capitol of France.  Due to approaching enemy invasion from the south though, Napoleon lll decided to establish the capital farther north in Paris!  We moved on to the Church of Notre Dame de Bordeaux, then a covered shopping street called Passage Sarget (similar to several of the covered passages in Paris).  We went to a bakery and tried the local sweet treats called "canneleés".  They are petite little cake-like treats the come in several sizes (1 bite, 2 bite, 4 bite), sticky and cartelized on the outside and softer inside - kind of the texture of moochi.  I'm not a fan of mocci so 1 bite was enough for me!  Next up was the Rue Sainte Catherine which is the longest pedestrian only shopping street in Europe, and measures in at 1.2 kilometers.  There are more than 250 shops and many bistros and cafes along this bustling street.  Our tour was on Sunday and stores weren't open in the morning, so we will head back here on another day to check it out.  Adrien showed lots of other sites that we are anxious to return to and check out on our own...lots to explore in Bordeaux.  Here are a few photos from our drizzly tour.

This is the Eleanor of Aquitaine gate, the only remaining part of her palace here in Bordeaux.  Eleanor was from Bordeaux (part of Aquitaine) and to form a military alliance, she married Louis VII of France.  She later divorced him and married Henry II of England, becoming the Queen of England and the mother of Richard the Lionheart, making her one of the most powerful women in Europe.  One of the most interesting facts about this palace (or what is left of it), is that the cannon holes are all facing INWARD to keep the citizens under control...not to keep the enemies out.  Yikes...what a time to be alive!

We kept seeing these brass markers in the streets...they mark the way of the Camino de Santiago, the pilgrimage trail that leads to the shrine of the apostle James in northwestern Spain.  This part of the camino is actually called "the French Way" and leads pilgrims in France to the main part of the Camino de Santiago...this French Way was typically takes 4 weeks to follow so we decided not to attempt it on this trip!!

This huge gothic church is the Cathedral of St. Andrew of Bordeaux and is the seat of the Archbishop of Bordeaux.  This is the church where in 1137 Eleanor the Duchess of Aquitaine married Louis VII when she was only 13 years old.

Inside of the smaller Notre Dame de Bordeaux church.

This is one of the most important sights in Bordeaux is the Monument aux Girondins at Place des Quinconces, (the largest public square in all of France) which commemorates the Girondists.  The Girondists were originally one of the groups which supported the French Revolution, but later began opposing the movement, and were executed under orders of one of the leaders of the Revolution, Robespierre.

I think the biggest attraction in Bordeaux is the Cite du Vin which is a museum, right on the Garonne river that is centered on wine related themes.  (quelle surprise!)  The contemporary architecture is built to resemble a wine decanter, has swirls of gold and red to reflect the most important part of Bordelaise life!  The exhibits inside are sensory and sensational.  Our tickets included 2 tastings, so we did one before going through the museum and one after.  The wine bar was on the roof with an outdoor terrace that had lovely views of the city.  Ron is a tad claustrophobic and chose not to go up the elevator so he is sadly not in any of our photos from the deck top wine bar...Gary is afraid of heights so we only got him outside for a brief moment!

We caught Ron catching a little nap while we were upstairs sipping wine!

There are 20 different themed sections covering everything from vine cultivation, grape varieties and wine production...and of course some wine tasting.  It's impossible to describe how creative the exhibits all are, but one of my favorites was about aroma detected in wines.  The large room had several tables with brass horns that looked like a saxophone or something...when you squeezed the black bulb, each one had a different scent (vanilla, peppercorns, pineapple, asian pear, rose...and a million more).  Some had individual scents, and then another one that had the combination of scents so you could see how they combine (vanilla + clove + blackberry)...SO interesting and fun!!

There was another silly/fun exhibit where the floor had projection a vat of grapes and if you stomped around on it the grapes disappeared.  Babette and I felt like Lucy and Ethel as we stomped away!  

Several great films of all the various wine regions around the world were interesting.  One of my favorite moments was seeing a father and his daughter (maybe 10 years old) going through the museum.  She was listening intently at each stop along the way, learning all about wine harvest, production, fermentation, etc.  It just seemed so fitting that this little French girl was getting a wine education at such a young age, and paying such close attention as she studied each exhibit with her father answering her questions).  

There was another cool exhibit called "at the table".  We all sat at a long dinner table without 15 other people and as the table became an interactive video screen, various emotions and words associated with wine were announced (bubbly, celebration, festive, family, celebration, refreshing, relaxing, flavor, scent and with each work, the table/screen changed - it was such a unique way to get you think about wine!  Sadly, it felt almost too intimate (like a dinner party) to film much of it. 

I can't urge you enough, if you are ever in Bordeaux you MUST go to the Cite du Vin!  Even if you are quite a vinophile and know all there is to know about wine, you will enjoy seeing how creatively this unique museum celebrates your favorite beverage!  If you are ever passing through Bordeaux and only have time to visit one attraction...this is the one to see!