Journée du Patrimoine

The other weekend we had the Journée du Patrimoine, the heritage days, where different historical buildings open their doors and you can visit these places for free. I chose to go and see the Domaine du Rieussec, an ancient roman villa, vineyard and gardens, a protected historical monument.

The first known documents of this site date from 853 and the wine making was already mentioned then. I like it already!!
The estate has belonged to the same family for more than five centuries and the buildings date back to the 16th century (renovated around 1860).

We were welcomed by the owner of the estate and the visit started from the gardens.

Lovely big selection of  trees and some exotic plants as well. The grounds are vast and the solitude is granted. No wonder the ancient pilgrims of Santiago de Compostela used to stop over here.

The ancient family burial ground.

The main house; rustic, but oh, so charming!

Orangerie, where they used to winter all the orange trees in the olden days. Nowadays they hire the place to use it for functions. At the moment they had a litttle art exhibition in there.

The view inside.

Old roman artefacts found from around the grounds of the villa.

And lets not forget the wine...These babies are still enjoying the sunshine until the very last moment. The harvest won't be as much as the previous years because of the incredibly hot summer, but the quality of the grapes will be excellent nevertheless.

And here they will go in time,  to make the transformation into delicious wine.

And last but not the least, we got into the business of  wine tasting. Very delicious indeed!