“How, exactly, did you pick this hotel?” Nick asked dubiously as we wound deeper and deeper into the forest along the Cousin River, following signs that got progressively smaller and smaller.
“I figured by now we’d want something quiet,” I explained, which really was the idea: a city hotel on the way down, and a country one on the way back.
You can tell when you cross into Burgundy. The soil here, although only a couple of subtle shades darker than that in Provence, is rich, and you can plant about twice as many grapes in the same space. The wheat is spaced more closely, too; it looks like you could almost walk on it, or at least lie flat on the tops, waving with the lawn of wheat in the breeze. It’s still hot, but the air is damp, and it’s a much less comfortable kind of heat.
We’re more comfortable here, though. As much as I love Provence, with its pale rosés, wild cliffs, lavender fields, and olive groves, there is something about Burgundy that feels more natural to both me and Nick. Even the food, although that’s a bit of a sticking point for me: I love fish, and landlocked regions tend toward heavier proteins. We’ve already crossed through Bresse (known for poultry) and Charolais (beef), but my hopes soared when I opened my guidebook and discovered that some river fish are also staples of the local diet. Our hotel is in the woody region known as the Morvan, and there, I read, I can get fresh trout.
I love trout.
So we found our hotel: a little building built over a functioning water-wheel, with nothing else in sight but woods and river. There are ducks, and a woman hiking with a massive brindled dog, and other guests, 95% of whom wear blazers in the dining room and library. You’re asked not to touch the books in the library, but they compensate for that with local wines and delicious little pastries. It is, in a word, perfect.
So we sat down and we sipped and nibbled and decompressed, and they brought us menus, which included river-raised trout three ways. I ordered the one with almonds, and we moseyed to a charming little corner table next to the water mill, and we listened to the trickle of the Cousin passing under our feet.
Sometime during the appetizers, Nick said, “I bet they’re catching your fish in the river.” Sounds a bit like the old joke about raising the chicken from an egg or butchering the cow out back, but the service wasn’t slow, so I didn’t get where he was going with that.
Turns out he was serious: he was looking into the river, where a metal cage hovered just below the surface. And, indeed, about halfway through the main course (the trout was extraordinary), a young man in a white coat came out with a bucket, opened the cage, and poured in the water from his bucket…along with three or four flashing silvery fish. Since we were the last ones seated at dinner, we can only guess that they take out about as many as they think they’ll need, and then put back the unordered ones for the next night once all the tickets are in. Really, it doesn’t get much fresher than that.