Taste of Gascony 

Sunday

BIENVENUE LUNCH WITH ANNIE IN TOULOUSE

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Noon: Meet Annie Sargent, host of Join Us in France podcast. Lunch will be held at a selected favorite restaurant in the city center of Toulouse. Here you will have the chance to get acquainted to your fellow tour participants and to ask Annie anything!

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Afternoon:  After lunch, we will begin our journey to the Gers. This is a 2 hour ride through rolling hills and lovely countryside. Along the way we will pass the Auch, capital city of the Gers and the picturesque medieval villages of Barran, L'Isle-de-Noé and Montesquiou.

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Arrival:  This is the time to settle into your accommodations, relax from the travel and explore around a bit to get acclimated. There is an opportunity to take a swim or a short hike around the gardens to begin to settle back, relax, reset and unwind.

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Evening:  Our first dinner together will be a traditional Gascogne meal beginning with a variety of apéros and the local cocktail, Le Pousse Rapière made with champagne and Armagnac. Together we will make a round of toasts and feel aligned to the legendary spirit of d'Artagnan and his loyal musketeers.

Monday

MARKET DAY AND A JOURNEY BACK INTO TIME

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Morning: After breakfast we head out to the bastide village of Mirande to browse the farmers market and enjoy small tastes of many wonderful local products. There we will also discover fabulous antique stores, local crafts and a co-operative boutique. Before lunch, we will have the chance to visit the Museum of Fine Arts, with a very unique collection of paintings that date back to the fifteenth century.

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Lunch: There are few things as exciting than a market day lunch in the spring. We will be welcomed by a wonderful cafe on the town square that serves modern Southwest French cuisine with a twist of contemporay flare and flavor.

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Afternoon: In the afternoon we visit the charming medieval village of Montesquiou. The village stems from a noble family line connected since the XIIc during the rule of King Philip II to d'Artagnan (on the mother’s side) and on up to the present day. There is a lovely castle to explore that remains perfectly intact from the 3rd crusade and on a clear day you can see forever from the top.

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Evening: Apéros followed by dinner from market ingredients and pâtisserie for dessert from one of the very best cake-masters in the Gers.

Tuesday

BASSOUES AND LUPIAC IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF D'ARTAGNAN

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Morning: After breakfast we journey to Bassoues for a tour of the medieval village that includes an esteemed African Art gallery, antique shops and pottery studios. We will also explore the famed XIc dungeon with beautiful gothic rooms and a spiral staircase of 197 steps for an optional climb to view the magnificent panorama of the countryside.

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Lunch: Bassoues is blessed to have one of the best restaurants in the Gers. Following the village tour we will meet here for a full lunch of delicious regional cuisine.

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Afternoon: The next stop on this journey is a visit to Lupiac, the home of our most famous local: Charles de Batz de Castelmore, or better known as d'Artagnan. Lupiac is a charming medieval village, with a lively local culture. Here we will visit a wide variety of brocantes, interesting galleries and the Musée d'Artagnan which has a wonderful collection of art and historical relics from the reign of King Louis XIV in the 17th century.

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Evening: Apéros followed by dinner with a local wine maker from a small family owned domaine to guide us through a tasting of each dish prepared specifically for the pairing. The meal will end with an aged Armagnac for slow sipping pleasure and to ensure a good night's sleep.

Wednesday

MARCIAC HOME OF THE JAZZ FESTIVAL AND COOKING WORKSHOP

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Morning: Following breakfast we tour the medieval village of Marciac that is famous for the International Jazz Festival in the summer. The village has a market on the square with a wide range of regional produce, and fine collection of talented artisans. It is also the home of the Chapelle Notre Dame de la Croix, which was built during the middle ages, and remains to have extraordinary acoustics for concerts.

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Noon: Lunch will be a set menu at a restaurant that specializes in a modern interpretation of traditional food by a young, inspiring chef who is very enthusiastic and talented. Marciac has attracted a diverse range of people globally over the years who now call it home, and this is reflected back in the culinary trends blended with local tradition in the cuisine.

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Afternoon: In the afternoon we will have a cooking workshop with a chef instructor who has expertise in regional gastronomy to create a wonderful meal from the items purchased at the market. This meal will include a selection local cheese and charcuterie, as well as a wine pairing from the wine of the Côtes-de-Gascogne (IGP).

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Evening: Apéros followed by dinner, sourced and prepared by the group in our cooking workshop.

Thursday

VISIT TO EAUZE THE CAPITAL CITY OF ARMAGNAC

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Morning: After breakfast we head out to the magnificent capital city of the Bas Armagnac region, Eauze. Here you will experience a lively market, the biggest in the Gers and for those more historically inclined you may chose to deviate to the Archaeological Museum with an exceptional treasure dating from the third-century Gallo-Roman era.

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Lunch: Lunch will be at my favorite Gascogne family run restaurant on the town square that specializes in the wonderful regional food of Southwest France.

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Afternoon: Following lunch, we will have a guided tour and tasting from a domain that has been growing grapes and distilling Armagnac for over eleven generations, their product is exceptional. They also produce very fine red, white and rosé wine, all from the harvest on the property. This domaine stands out among the rest for the historical museum tucked into the tasting room. This exhibit of real farm artifacts transforms you back to the early days when production was done entirely by hand and horse drawn plows. If you look closely you will also discover casks of Armagnac in glass saved, labeled and preserved from this time.

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Evening: Our closing dinner together will feature the highlights of the cuisine that we tried and enjoyed over the week. It will also include a fine selection of local wines both from the Côtes-de-Gascogne (IGP) as well as the nearby region of Madiran (AOC). You will leave with a strong familiarity of the region’s viticulture, and with the confidence to seek out wines from Gascony on the next wine list you encounter at your favorite restaurent back home.

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Friday

FIN DU TOUR

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Morning: After breakfast transportation will be provided back to Toulouse. You will be dropped at the same pick up location from where we began.