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My belle amie Karen has travelled numerous times to France (quite a lot avec moi!) and has twice stayed in the Champagne region.  I'm so jealous as unfortunately a trip planned for my old school friends and I was called off in 2020 in the week we were supposed to depart. We're all getting used to that in the time of COVID but hopefully we'll get there eventually!

Karen is the best researcher I know when it comes to travel! When I was planning the ill-fated 2020 shenanigans and was going to the Champagne Region, Karen was my first contact to find out all her brilliant tips for a stay in that spot. 

I love the Madame Bollinger quote about champagne…

She was asked when do you drink champagne?

"I drink it when I am sad. Sometimes I drink it when I am alone. When I have company I consider it obligatory. I trifle with it when I’m not hungry. I drink it when I am. Otherwise I never touch it, unless I am thirsty…"

I also love what Madame de Pompadour is supposed to have said that “Champagne is the only drink that leaves a woman still beautiful after drinking it”. Now that’s good enough for me!

The champagne region is the place that conjures images of the bubbles that accompany many of our celebrations. Karen and I had a gorgeous weekend “sweetie darling” in Paris a couple of years ago in 2018 where we worked through a wonderful list of all the places she had researched that we could drink champagne in Paris. So we went to traditional bars, amazing little holes in the walls, pop up restaurants, cafes by the river, and all the time we never more than a glow of wonderfulness, such is the amazing quality of champagne!

Recently I have re-watched the wonderful little doco with Jennifer Saunders and Joanna Lumley from Ab Fab called Absolutely Champers. They start in London, in the champagne bar at the TGV station at St Pancras which has 120 Varieties of champagne and is the longest champagne bar in Europe. Karen and I have never started a trip there, we’ve always started in Paris together, so I think we will definitely start there some day in the future. 

Hear all our tips for staying in the Champagne region as well as some fascinating history, plus some recommendations for docos too. 
So pour a glass of bubbly, or un coupe de champagne and come and escape with us to France! 

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Louise Prichard is the host of the Loulabelle's FrancoFiles podcast.
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