It might appear that not much has happened around here for the last week – but – I’ve been extra-busy but unfortunately not everything was wine-related.

Last Thursday was a very early start, driving to the UK for a family funeral, returning, equally early on Sunday. A result of over 3,000 km driven in a week. Unfortunately returning with a cold too.

Well, I’d hoped that it was just a cold but I decided to seek a PCR-test as the red-light, green-light of whether I could head to Burgundy. The light was green.

The green light meant a trip to Villefranche to the marketing home of Beaujolais to taste the 2021 Nouveau samples (right). In recent years over 160 samples had been presented to taste but this year only a little over 100 – they also had frost and hail this year! A report should appear here in the Diary in the next 10 days. At my request I tasted separate from other tasters as I was developing an annoying cough – and negative or not, I’m sure that they would have become a bit pissed off with that. My palate had been reasonably fine but I was completely fatigued by the time I returned to Beaune in the evening – the cough worsening and the nose starting to block.

I’ve been lucky, I suppose, because previous vintage tastings seem to have avoided the clash with bacteria or viruses – but not today – for the first time ever, I had to cancel all of today’s visits and rest up. From another perspective, that was quite lucky, because parking was at a premium in Beaune today – the whole of the centre was cordoned off while the street ‘cleaners’ attempted to collect the falling leaves. And the reason? Apparently, Monsieur Macron was talking Angela Merkel to visit the Hospices de Beaune before their next rendezvous, for lunch, in the Château of the Clos Vougeot – no sniffles there, I’m sure!

Today my cough has begun to subside and my nose has been at least 50% open. I haven’t cancelled any of my 5 visits to taste tomorrow – so wish me luck 😉