[2012] Epernay, France

We enjoyed a 2 nights in Epernay with our friends Mari and Liam during our spring break. We really liked the Moet and Chandon tour to their underground cellars that are massive! Supposedly they have F1 races down there?! Our minds were boggled trying to calculate how many bottles were stored in the one hallway we went through, let alone how much it was worth. The unfortunate part of the tour was the promo video they played for us right at the beginning. We were put in a room to watch a ~7min long commercial, while Scarlett Johansson narrated with key words like: luxury, fragrant, effervescence, etc. BARF! What a major turn off. They almost won us over when we were forced to pick up our two glasses of champagne at the same time, encouraging us to double fist white and rose champagne. Classy~

Our highlight was the restaurant La Grillade Gourmande. Wonderful food, great atmosphere, really really good wine pairings and an amazing owner that made you feel like special guests to his personal home.

We had another one of our meals at a Thai restaurant where local musicians performed. At the end of the evening I had the courage to asked one of them if I could try out their accordion. The accordion is my new favourite instrument. (I actually have a personal rule that if a street performer is playing the accordion I must give them some money--this is my attempt to ensure that accordions keep being played) I was able to push out a um-cha-cha beat while I made a simple melody with my left hand, even though it was my first time trying one out. I think everyone was impressed, or at least they feigned it when they applauded my efforts! **It should be noted that there were only a handful of people left in the restaurant at this point, mainly my friends and the staff.

Hopefully next time we go Perrier & Jouet will be open because it was NEVER open to sell us their pretty bottles of champagne. Or their pretty champagne flutes at that.