Wine Tasting in the South of France - Gerard Betrand - Chateau L'Hospitalet

So after a few days inland getting held up by a plethora of tractors, we went out towards the coast. First stop was Chateau L'Hospitalet one of the many vineyards owned by former French Rugby International, Gerard Betrand. My brother knew about his wine from the 5 different wines they sell at Majestic wine.

The setting for the Vineyard was lovely, rolling hills and the sea in the distance. It has a small hotel with a restaurant, pool etc, and a lovely large tasting room.  The tasting room was far more like other tasting rooms I had been to, particularly in California.  The two young people working when we visited were British students on their working abroad year which made it very easy for them to tell us about the wines in English.

In terms of the quality of the wine, this was my favourite of the wines I tasted over the week, but to give you an idea of scale, they produce between 20-30 million bottles a year (the youngsters told us two different figures). Compare that to the 27,000 bottles that La Grange Leon produces (the first vineyard we went to on the day we arrived).

The Chateau is one of 11 vineyards owned by Mr Betrand. We tried 7 different wines, and with the exception of a very light rose, I really enjoyed all of them. It was at this point I really started to regret that we were travelling just with hand luggage and couldn't take any home. I tried to persuade my brother to drive down here in his van next time and load it up with a plethora of lovely wine.

Dad and my brother picked up an expensive bottle for us to drink on our final night, and with a couple more bottles in hand we carried on down to the coast..

I will certainly be heading to Majestic to get some of his smooth bold reds in for long winter evenings...

http://www.gerard-bertrand.com/en/