The Wine Monument Tour 2014

Although it’s not the first tour of the year, it’s the first I’ve decided to blog about. I given/been on so many that I now consider myself somewhat of a pro at giving wine monument tours of Paris. I highly recommend this idea for anyone living in Paris or thinking of taking a trip.

If you’re interested in doing your own WMT all you need is:

• Wine openers/bottle openers (seems obvious, but they’re almost always forgotten, and making the trip back to get one can throw your whole day off. Remember that you’re squeezing an entire city’s worth of monuments into one day. You will need the whole day, especially because things start to move slower as more wine is consumed.
• Enough plastic cups for everyone in the group, if your city has no problem with public intoxication, like in Paris. Enough travel mugs if you’re in a city that does.

Depending on how classy you want your day to be, the tour can also be called the “Drunk Monument Tour,” and you can switch out your wine for something stronger. Here’s how to make that distinction: If you want a pleasant yet semi-strong buzz flowing through you throughout the day while you appreciate the architecture of the city you’re touring, choose wine. If you are the tour guide, definitely choose wine. If you’re in Paris, choose wine. It’s fucking Paris. If you are a lightweight, choose wine. This isn’t the night club tour 2014. Calm down.

 

 

We started at the most famous monument, because I live closest to it. The Eiffel Tower. 

Because it’s that wonderful time of year, stands everywhere were selling vin chaud, (heated wine!) which was delicious and supplied us with the cups we needed. A cup of vin chaud was about 3 euros, and can be found near almost any monument when the weather is cold. The bottles of wine that we bought after were the same price, and could also be found cheaper. Vive La France.

 

 

From there we headed to

l’Arc de Triomphe

, and walked down the

Champs Elysees

. Here is a photo of a completely ridiculous entrance to an Abercrombie and Fitch.

At the end of the Champs Elysees there was a beautiful and colossal Marché de Noël (Christmas Market,) which can be found all over Paris during this time of year; though this one might be the biggest. It was packed with stands for food and drinks, rides; booths selling christmasy things, and booths there for pure commercialism. It was wonderful.

(That photo was probably the worst one I could have taken, and really does not to the marché any justice, but hey – at least that gives you a frame of reference for the amount of wine consumed at that point.)

Yeah, at the point I was just taking snap chats. So, the picture literally says it all.

A photo of Katie and I, a friend from London and the reason for the tour. (Look out for the WMT of London, which will be happening, soon.)

We ended the tour at the Louvre. Remember to plan ahead of time, and to drink the wine slowly enough to get that perfect buzz throughout the day, otherwise you might end your tour looking like this:

xo à bientôt