As I have mentioned, St. Émilion is chock-full of excellent restaurants, a number of which have Michelin Stars. While that is great, we had a bit of trouble finding a somewhat casual restaurant for lunch in St. Émilion! This difficulty was enchanched by the fact that Dan is allergic to duck, and a lot of Southwestern cuisine (St. Émilion is in the Southwest of France) prominently features duck on the menu.
As you may know from reading my Wine Cruising to Sauternes post, there are, to many tourists surprise, no vineyards or wine châteaux in the city of Bordeaux! All of the châteaux that make the famous “Bordeaux wine” are located in designated areas around Bordeaux. St. Émilion is one of those areas and in my opinion, is the easiest and best Bordeaux wine region to visit on your own (i.e. without joining a tour) from Bordeaux!
St. Emilion vineyards
St. Émilion is world renowned for its full-bodied red wines. But St. Émilion is also an extremely well preserved medieval town that is complete with a unique system underground passageways, wine cellars and even an underground church! As you can imagine, St. Émilion is a very popular day trip from Bordeaux and all of the tour companies offer day trips to St. Émilion from Bordeaux, starting €80,00/person and going up from there. However, St. Émilion is easily accessible from Bordeaux by train on your own, so that is what we did. St. Émilion was my favorite day trip out of Bordeaux and a “must do” for anyone in the area!
Medieval St. Emilion
