Tuesday 8 March 2011

Stocking up

After a day in London to catch up and change from summer to winter clothes - it was below freezing on our first morning - we decided to pop over to Reims to pick up some champagne - our supplies having reached danger level. Great deal from Eurotunnel - £40 return - and a clear drive to the terminal meant that we arrived early only to find that the service was disrupted. Despite initial fears of a 3-4 hour wait, we managed to get on the shuttle just over an hour late - thanks to all those daytrippers who decided to cancel and take the refund.

Since it is three years since our last 'champagne run' we decided to head straight for our favourite Cave only to find that they no longer produce our 'house' champagne. This of course meant that we had to start from scratch -tasting as many as we could - trying to find a replacement. Think I managed 17 tastings before I realised it would probably be better to get the car to the hotel car park before I had any more!

Reims has changed quite a bit in the last three years - they have managed to complete the installation of a new tram system which wasn't even started when we were last here. Perhaps they could offer some advice to Edinburgh City Council.

Thanks to our sterling tasting efforts we managed to select a new 'house' champagne, loaded up the car on Sunday morning and headed back to Calais with enough time to allow us to stop and buy a few bottles of wine as well. Less than 27 hours on French soil and back in London in time to reorganise and pack again ready for our separate trips to Edinburgh and Port Solent this morning.

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