The Golden Ticket of Cognac

As a purely cultural stop on the road towards Mont Saint Michel I inserted an overnight stay in Cognac. This stop was on one of their more important festivals of the year. It was something to do with street art. I'd be lying to say that was what attracted me.

Anyway after lucking out with the Martell Cognac brand for an English tour my hotel was able to find an English tour with Hennessy. Being the only distiller of the 6 or so main cognac distillers I would take I decided to pay the little bit extra for the XO & Chocolate tour.

Little did I know was the fact that this was the Golden Ticket. I ended up the only person on my tour of about 8 Europeans, and 20 or so package tour Chinese who paid for the better quality nip at the end. Everyone else just got the 2 nips of the standard cognac, and some other drink they produce. Heck the Chinese were on a classic tour, shoot and shuffle timetable. They weren't even staying to savour the drop so much.

 I on the other hand got to taste the XO. Which apparently stands for extra old. This stuff had a blend of Cognacs from something like 25 to 100 years old. Not that you could taste it. Unlike Single Malt Whisky the blending process ensures that every Cognac is the same from year to year. However you can't fault  place where the historical tour even includes showing the barrel room with the Cognac from the 1800s.

Cognac itself is a quaint town. It's not entirely off the tourist route but is treated much like the Chinese tour treated it. A tour and gone. However with the street art festival I found entertainment in the evening. Even if I didn't understand what the performance artists were saying.