Wine and Spirits Travel

The final day in Burgundy wasn’t exactly how it was supposed to be.  The cold weather and rain did not ease up and our plan to bicycle around the canal needed to be scrapped.  But the day was still filled with new adventures, thanks to our friends, Anna from the French Tourist Board and Veronique from Burgundy Tourism. Our first stop of the day was at the castle of Ancy le Franc .  Honestly, my initial response was, “another castle?”  but I have to admit that every one we have seen has had a personality of its own.  This one in Ancy le Franc was beautiful and was set up more like a museum than a castle, with endless artwork and detail to the architecture.  It had its own private chapel and royal apartments.  Despite the fact that this castle is very much in France, its influence is very Italian.  It was first built in the 16 th century and received some additional renovations – like a new library and a dining room with Italian marble walls – in the 19 th century.  The grounds,

I thought I had seen it all when – on my last day in the Champagne region --  we visited talking robots and a Champagne Bar in the trees, but there was something even more unusual to see and it is called Guedelon . Burgundy is filled with castles, but none like Guedelon .  The weather continued to be cold and there seemed to be a bit of rain following us .   This mud-producing climate wasn’t exactly what you wanted when you were visiting a construction site and that’s exactly what Guedelon was, only this site was missing your usual tractors, electrical equipment and safety nets.  This was a construction site for a castle, more specifically, a castle built in the 13 th century. The Guedelon project began in 1995 when Michel Guyot, who already owned a castle in Yonn, had the idea to build this one in Treigny the same way the Medieval workers did it.  He banished anything that wasn’t used in the 13 th century and spent two years gathering the support and permits from France.  He e