Burgundy

Burgundy is the centre of the wine world, and it knows it. The Côte d’Or — a narrow strip of limestone hillside running from Dijon to Santenay — produces Pinot Noir and Chardonnay of a precision and expressiveness that no other region on earth has consistently matched. The villages read like a wine list at a three-star restaurant: Gevrey-Chambertin, Vosne-Romanée, Nuits-Saint-Georges, Meursault, Puligny-Montrachet. Walking through the vineyards here, with their hand-painted signs marking individual plots, is walking through a landscape where every square meter has been studied, debated, and cultivated for centuries.

But Burgundy is not only wine. Beaune is a small city with a medieval hospital (the Hospices de Beaune, with its polychrome tiled roof) that doubles as a wine auction house. The Saturday market fills the central square with enough cheese, charcuterie, and mustard to stock a small country.

Vézelay, on the northern edge of the region, is a hilltop village with a Romanesque basilica that was the starting point for one of the four French routes of the Camino de Santiago. The view from the terrace at sunset — rolling green hills fading into the Morvan forest — is one of the finest in France.

The Canal de Bourgogne offers a different pace entirely: rent a barge or cycle the towpath through a landscape of locks, villages, and poplars that looks unchanged since the 19th century.

The food is Burgundy’s other gift. Boeuf bourguignon originated here. Escargots de Bourgogne. Gougères — cheese puffs served warm with a glass of Chablis. Époisses, the washed-rind cheese so pungent it is banned on public transport and so delicious it justifies the ban.

When to go: September for the grape harvest. May for wildflowers in the vineyards and cool mornings on the canal.