Champagne Caves & Cathedrals
Four days between the grandes maisons and the growers — chalk caves, Gothic spires, and the vineyards of the Montagne de Reims.
Champagne is two places at once. Above ground: cathedral cities, grand boulevards, and the palatial headquarters of the world's most famous wine houses. Below ground: hundreds of kilometres of chalk crayères — Roman quarries repurposed as the most extraordinary wine cellars on earth, where millions of bottles age in near-perfect darkness. This four-day itinerary moves between both worlds.
The grandes maisons — Krug, Ruinart, Bollinger, Taittinger — are the obvious draw, and rightly so. But the Montagne de Reims villages hold the itinerary's best surprises: small grower-producers farming Pinot Meunier and Pinot Noir on slopes the big houses rarely touch, making wines of startling individuality. The contrast between the two is the whole point.
Reims — Cathedrals, Crayères & Krug
Reims Cathedral
Arrive Reims by TGV from Paris — 45 minutes from Gare de l'Est. Drop your bags and walk immediately to the cathedral. Notre-Dame de Reims is one of the great Gothic buildings of Europe, the church where 25 kings of France were crowned, and the place where Champagne's identity as a region of ceremony and celebration was forged. The west façade's 2,300 sculpted figures reward an hour of slow looking.
Ruinart — The Roman Crayères
Founded in 1729, Ruinart is the oldest Champagne house, and its chalk crayères — Roman quarries cut 38 metres into the hillside beneath the city — are the most atmospheric cellars in Champagne. The guided visit descends into a UNESCO-listed labyrinth where 10 million bottles age in near-perfect conditions. The tasting that follows, focused on Ruinart's Blanc de Blancs and the prestige Dom Ruinart, is among the finest introductions to Champagne's range of styles.
Krug — Prestige by Appointment
Krug requires advance booking and rewards the effort. The house's philosophy — every wine a prestige cuvée, every base wine aged in small oak barrels — produces Champagnes of extraordinary complexity and longevity. The tasting typically includes the Grande Cuvée alongside a vintage or single-vineyard Clos du Mesnil if the stars align. Dinner in Reims at Le Foch or Brasserie du Boulingrin.
Taittinger & the Montagne de Reims Growers
Morning: Taittinger
Taittinger's cellars occupy a 13th-century abbey beneath central Reims — the combination of Gothic vaulting and chalk crayères is unique in Champagne. The house is best known for its Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blancs, one of the region's benchmark prestige cuvées, made entirely from Grand Cru Chardonnay from the Côte des Blancs. The morning visit includes a walk through the abbey ruins before the tasting.
Afternoon: Montagne de Reims — Verzenay & Mailly
Drive south from Reims into the Montagne de Reims, the forested plateau whose north-facing slopes produce some of Champagne's most structured Pinot Noirs. Stop at the Phare de Verzenay — a lighthouse incongruously planted in the middle of the vineyards in 1909, now a wine museum with panoramic views across the Marne plain. Then into the village of Mailly-Champagne, home to the celebrated Mailly Grand Cru cooperative, whose single-village Champagnes are among the region's best-value Grand Crus.
Late Afternoon: Champagne André Clouet, Bouzy
Bouzy is one of the Montagne de Reims's great Grand Cru villages, and André Clouet is its finest grower-producer. Jean-François Clouet farms 4.5 hectares of old-vine Pinot Noir on the village's south-facing slopes, producing Champagnes of remarkable depth and a still red Bouzy Rouge that is one of Champagne's rarest pleasures. The tasting at the family cellar is intimate and unhurried.
Épernay — The Avenue de Champagne & Bollinger
The Avenue de Champagne
Move to Épernay — 25 minutes south of Reims by car or train. The Avenue de Champagne is Champagne's great set piece: a broad boulevard lined with the palatial headquarters of Moët & Chandon, Perrier-Jouët, Pol Roger, and a dozen other grandes maisons, their cellars running beneath the street for kilometres in every direction. The avenue is best walked slowly, with a stop at Moët's 28km of chalk galleries — the largest cellar network in Champagne.
Bollinger, Aÿ
A short drive east brings you to Aÿ and Bollinger — a grande maison that has always felt closer to a grower-producer in spirit. The house still maintains its own reserve wine system in magnums, still uses traditional cork closures for disgorgement, and still farms a significant proportion of its own vineyards. The tasting includes the Special Cuvée, the vintage R.D. (recently disgorged), and, if you're fortunate, a pour from the Vieilles Vignes Françaises — Bollinger's extraordinary pre-phylloxera Pinot Noir from two tiny ungrafted plots in Aÿ.
Dinner in Épernay
Épernay's restaurant scene has improved markedly in recent years. Les Berceaux remains the classic choice — a proper French hotel-restaurant with a wine list that runs to hundreds of Champagne references and a kitchen that takes the local produce seriously. Book ahead.
Meunier Country — Champagne José Michel & the Valley Villages
Morning: Champagne José Michel, Moussy
The Vallée de la Marne south of Épernay is Meunier country — the grape that the grandes maisons blend away is here the star. José Michel in Moussy is one of the valley's most respected grower-producers, farming 20 hectares of predominantly Meunier vines and making Champagnes of unusual richness and texture. The tasting at the family domaine covers the full range, from the entry-level Brut Tradition to the prestige Spécial Club — one of the Champagne region's most distinctive wines.
Afternoon: Hautvillers — Dom Pérignon's Village
No Champagne itinerary is complete without Hautvillers, the hilltop village above Épernay where the Benedictine monk Dom Pérignon served as cellar master from 1668 to 1715. The abbey church contains his tomb; the village itself — all wrought-iron signs and immaculate stone houses — is the prettiest in the region. The views across the Marne Valley from the abbey terrace are the best in Champagne.
Final Tasting: Champagne Larmandier-Bernier, Vertus
End the itinerary with a visit to Larmandier-Bernier in Vertus on the northern Côte des Blancs — one of Champagne's most celebrated biodynamic grower-producers. Pierre Larmandier's Blanc de Blancs Champagnes, made from old-vine Chardonnay on the chalk soils of Vertus Premier Cru, are among the most intellectually satisfying wines in the region: precise, mineral, and built for the long term.
Trip Highlights
- Ruinart's Roman chalk crayères — the oldest Champagne house cellar in Reims
- Krug's prestige cuvée tasting in Reims
- The Avenue de Champagne, Épernay — the most expensive street in France
- Bollinger in Aÿ — a grande maison that still feels like a family estate
- Grower-producer tastings in Verzenay and Bouzy on the Montagne de Reims
- Reims Cathedral — the coronation church of the kings of France