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Vieux Château Certan, Pomerol

    Vieux Château Certan was the most prized château in Pomerol between 1770 and 1875 when it was owned by the Demay family. In 1875 the chateau lost its top spot to Ch. Pétrus, which incidentally it joins as a neighbour. The two châteaux have the highest proportion of buttonhole clay on the high terrace of Pomerol. However, the concentration of the clay at Pétrus is higher, which partly attributes to its success over Vieux Château Certan.
    Vieux Château Certan's wine is composed of 85% Merlot and 15% Cabernet Franc, set amongst 13.5 ha. Vieux Château Certan's style has always been lighter than that of La Conseillante and Pétrus. The reason for this may be the fact that they use only 75% new oak in their maturation, as opposed to 100% from the top two.

Ch. Chasse-Spleen, Moulis en Médoc. Cru Bourgeois Exceptionnel

    Château Chasse-Spleen is the leading Moulis estate along with Château Poujeaux. Although it is classified only as a Cru Bourgeois, it regularly outperforms many of the Médoc's more renowned classed growths. There are two theories behind the château’s rather unusual name: firstly, that, when Lord Byron visited the estate in 1821 on his way to Spain, he remarked “Quel remède pour chasser le spleen”. Secondly, that it is derived from Baudelaire’s poem, Spleen et Ideal illustrated by Odilon Redon, one of the château’s neighbours and friend of the author.
     Luckily Mme Castaing, the first owner, had the good sense to listen to one of these two famous poets. Due to a joint possession, she inherited some of the best plots of land on the crest of Grand Poujeaux. Unfortunately it was too late for the classification of 1855, but in 1932 a new classification brought her wine up to the grade of Grand Cru Exceptionnel with only five other Chateaux.

    On the Route des Chateaux in the Médoc, just after the village of Arcins, to the left after the famous inn the Lion d'Or, are the vineyards of Chasse-Spleen. South of the gravelly brow of Grand Poujeaux, this vineyard benefits from a remarkably well-drained subsoil and is superbly well exposed to the hot summer sun.
     The soil is composed of 80% Garonne gravel on a chalky substratum and 20% chalky clay. Before the vines were planted only extremely rustic cereal like rye grew on this land. The climate is also particularly important. The rainy Médoc springtime constitutes a water reserve in the buried tertiary shelf. A hot summer is hard on the vines, and means that the roots must go even deeper underground for their necessary water supply. This cruel weather and the poor earth are exactly what is needed for the Médoc grape varieties.
     The 80 hectare vineyard is planted with 73% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot and 7% Petit Verdot averaging about 30 years old. Vinification is in stainless steel vat and covered epoxy cement with temperature control by thermal pipe. The wine remains in vat for around one month before ageing between 12 and 18 months in oak barriques, of which 40% are new each year. It is bottled unfiltered.
    Chasse-Spleen’s wines were always noteworthy, though the quality improved dramatically with its acquisition by the Taillan Group, which also owns Château Haut-Bages-Libéral, in 1976. It was run by Bernadette Villars until she and her husband were killed in an accident while hiking in the Pyrénées in 1992. The property is now run by her daughter Claire. The current winemaker is Jean-Pierre Foubet.
    Chasse-Spleen wines are typically deeply-coloured and full-bodied on the palate, displaying oodles of ripe, black fruit, minerals and sometimes hints of chocolate.