Bored with Beaujolais?

Had it with Nouveau Beaujolais? Check out the Nouveau Roussillon Wine Festival.

The French Tour Co have teamed up with Frogbus.com to offer you an incredible getaway experience during the annual Roussillon Wine Festival in Perpignan. Ideal for wine lovers who also enjoy a little pampering, french cuisine and late summer sun.

Put it in your diary: Thursday October 15th to Sunday October 18th.

The itinerary includes 3 nights B&B in a new luxurious spa resort, 1 evening meal, a guided wine tour with four course lunch and tastings in 3 top vineyards where we meet the vineyard owners, a day in Perpignan soaking up the atmosphere of the Wine Harvest Festival and a day in coastal Collioure, rated one of the most beautiful villages in France.
Transfers from nearby Girona ( 1 hour) are included in the special price of 379euros inclusive ( single supplement is extra)
Full use of all spa facitilies is included in the price.

For more details and to book your place , click here on Perpignan Wine Festival Tour

The Red Beret from Ceret!

Looking for something to do from Ceret on Monday 17th of August? Love the Roussillon wines and interested in learning more about them? Well, unusually, The Red Beret Wine Tour departs from Ceret this Monday.

It promises to be a superbe day taking in 3 very different vineyards, meeting the owners of the Chateaux, sampling some of the best quality wines from this region, learning how it is made and much much more.

I hasten to add, for you gourmet lovers, there will be a delicious 3 course lunch with wine at the vigneron's table. Best of all The French Tour Co collects and drops you off at your place of stay.

This will be an insightful tour of life as a vineyard owner - come along for the fun, the knowledge and of course, the vino!

Email Suzanne at info@thefrenchtourco.com

Music and Dance in the South of France

For the 67th time running Amelie les Bains is staging their renowned International Folklorique Festival from August 4th to August 9th.

Folk music and dance groups from Spain, France, Greece, and Columbia promise to make this a very colourful and exciting festival. Each day there are parades, dancing on the streets, theater and lots of live music.

Not to be missed is the Colombian folk group in the medieval village of Palalda on the 4th. Mingle with the locals at an open-air aperitif for all on Wed the 5th with Flamenco Dancing. Dress up for the "Amelie Danse Ball" being held on Thursday night, entrance is free. Friday the Greek take over the show and Saturday if filled with fun for Theater lovers. There is a Grande Finale on Sunday with all participants present from 9 PM at the closing gala.

After all that song and dance - contact the French Tour Co for a relaxing spa tour!

10 good reasons to visit the Perpignan area this Autumn

The Pyrenees Orientales has it all : ski resorts, sandy beaches, a Mediterranean climate, fantastic scenery, rocky coastline ideal for snorkeling, great food and superbe wines, bustling markets, historical monuments and castles, friendly Catalan people, mountains and plains, lakes and rivers, gorges and caves, rugby and excellent sporting facilities, a good sized town with all amenities, virtually no pollution .. and if you need further convincing, here are 10 good reasons to visit the Pyrenees Orientales this Autumn :

1) VISA pour L'Image - the International Festival of Photojournalism which takes place from 29 aug to 13 september : VISA

2) Munster are coming to play USAP ( Perpignan) in the Heineken cup on 20th December. Promises to be a great match and a great day out with Munsters Red Army

3) The Wine festival in Perpignan on the 15 and 17 October where many winemakers come to Perpignan to share their new vintage. The French tour co will be organising special tours around this

4) Visit the museum of modern art in Ceret for a look at all the painters that have lived in Ceret over the last 100 years. Original art works from Picasso, Terrus, Braque and others are well worth a visit. Running until 31 Oct

5) Take part in one of our gourmet tours where we match food and wine in the company of the experts : wine makers and chefs du cuisine. yum!

6) Visit the medieval market in Place Gambetta, Perpignan - a traditional festival where you travel back in time - 12/13 Sept

7) Come for a swim in the sea - the sea temperatures will be still in the teens up to the middle of October. From Barcares to Cerbere, discover the wonderful coastline on one of our coastal tours

8) Jump out of a plane - sign up for one of our adventure tours and see the region as you've never seen it before!

9) Come for a game of golf in the balmy Autumn weather. Choose from 14 fine golf courses in the Languedoc Roussillon

10)Escape the recession blues - Rent a yacht with your friends with a skipper and take off towards the horizon on a get away from it all few days

Getting to Perpignan

HOP TO FRANCE FROM SPAIN!
BUS ROUTE: GOOD NEWS FOR our clients using Girona Airport (GRO) in northern Spain as an entry point into France to take part in one of our many tours
Low-cost bus company FROGBUS.com have just launched additional routes connecting Girona airport directly with popular tourist resorts in the Pyrénées-Orientales area of Southern France.
In addition, FROGBUS.com will also operate a once daily service from Barcelona airport (BCN) into France.
New destinations served directly from Girona & Barcelona airports include Argeles sur Mer, Canet, Barcares, St Marie, Les Angles and Font Romeu.
FROGBUS.com will be extending its routes in the coming months to create a network connecting Toulouse and Barcelona (and others) with regular multi-day services. Click here to contact FROGBUS.com

Buying your wedding wine in the Languedoc Roussillon

Recently we've had quite a few couples on our wine tours doing some scouting around to buy their wine for their wedding in éire or the UK.
It's an excellent idea as alot of French wine , particularly in Ireland, is not of the highest quality at a certain price level.
Here, in the Languedoc Roussillon region, you can purchase a decent quality wine for around the €6 mark or less.
Some of our partner vineyards will ship the wine to a Northern port for easy collection, at no extra cost.

This week, we had a couple from Limerick, Ireland who settled on their red and white - they have a house here and plan to come down and pack up their car with wine and drive their precious cargo back to the ole sod.

Some points to ponder :

You are allowed to bring 120 bottles of wine per person into Ireland for personal use without paying any additional taxes. However, if you have your wedding cert with you , and can prove that your purchases are for private consumption, you can bring as much wine as you like

The wedding experts recommend that a half a bottle per person at a wedding should be enough - however, if it is an Irish wedding : double that!!!! Always buy a little more than you anticipate - well, it won't go to waste afterwards, will it?

Do taste alot of wines - good advice is to opt for middle of the road wines - nothing too adventurous or whacky. Good fun to have a blind wine tasting with some friends

Look at your menu and decide what wines will go with what you have chosen to eat

Get advice from the experts - if you do a wine tour here with us, you will be meeting the winemakers and the vineyard owners who will be very happy to help

After the food for your wedding, the drinks will probably be the other big expense - it's worthwhile to spend a little time to get it right

Negotiate the corkage with your hotel

Relax and enjoy and let The French Tour Co do the driving!

Merci le French Tour Co

Nice ot get some positive feedback again from one of our happy clients:

Karen and Suzanne were brilliant. At very short notice they managed to arrange everything from airport transfers to a fantastic vineyard tour – all at excellent value. Their patience and humour at all times was greatly appreciated – in itself a miracle considering we were a party of 11 on a stag do... I’ll definitely be looking them up again when next in the the Perpignan region”.
Nico Tuppen. Brighton, England.