Our James is, of course, the ultimate wine connoiseur. However, can even he tell if a bottle of champagne has been aged in the sea? Remember Sean Connery in those short shorts in the undersea temple? Pierce Brosnan in the wet suit?
What does this all have to do with Champagne and Mont St. Michel, you may well ask? Last year, some top French champagne cellarmasters experimented with creating the ultimate in exclusivity: an underwater wine cellar. They had divers hide bottles 15 meters under water along the coast of the tidal island of Mont St. Michel. The idea was that aging in the sea is ideal: a constant low temperature, a gentle rocking motion, and absolutely no danger of UV exposure. They should be assessing about now whether maturing champagne in the sea is different or better than in the traditional cellar. Can’t you just see the James Bond taste-off scene now?
Mont St. Michel is a UNESCO inscribed World Heritage Site. It is off the coast of Normandy and only becomes an island when the tide rushes in. It is famous for stranding people (or it was before the silt problem). It has a functioning monastery and is stunningly beautiful.
So, combine a visit to Mont St. Michel with your first screen play, submit it to Albert Broccoli, and retire to your fully-modernized Normandy farmhouse, there to sip champagne and think kind thoughts about Sabrina and Wandering France.
See Mont St. Michel here:
(Note: Image provided by Wikipedia)