Roman rock

From here on the main road to Roquessels the view shows the vine leaves just beginning to turn their autumn colours. The vendange is over, the grapes have all been picked for another year. The uncultivated rock in the centre is said to have been untouched since Roman times with the same varieties of plants still growing there. Even though many of the vines here grow in schiste, a shale-like terrain, this hill looks quite safe from agricultural attention, fortunately.

Our son will be arriving tomorrow and we were running uncharacteristically low on wine so a trip to our favourite domain at Roquessels, in the hills just to the left of this shot, was one of this morning's tasks. It's a few weeks early for the real autumn colour, but even so the sweep of vineyards looked wonderful on a clear, blowy morning.

Quite nice in LARGE