Montmartre Vine Festival

Montmartre, a hilly area of Paris, was from early history covered with vineyards. Because of lack of good transportation to bring the “better wines” into Paris, the local vineyards produced the wine for the local taverns and cabarets. About the time the early 20th century transportation had improved and wine could be brought in from other areas, the plant lice had about decimated the vineyards in Montmartre. Most vineyards were then used for other purposes.

In the 1920’s a group of artists decided to start a project to turn one sloping piece of property back into a small vineyard. The vineyard was planted in 1933 and the first harvest was in 1934. This area is not large….probably about ½ of a block by USA standards, but it contains 2000 vine plants which produce about 1,700 half liter bottles of wine a year. Regretfully, this is not available for purchase, but is all auctioned off for charities in the Montmartre area. (Some people say that this is not all bad as the wine is not very drinkable anyway!!!)

Parisians hardly need an excuse for a celebration, but each October they have a wine festival in Montmartre, timed to the arrival of the new wine. This celebration includes parades, booths, fireworks, musical events, food, drink (of course) and just general festivities. This year it was called the “Montmartre Fete Les Trois Baudits which interprets as the “Montmartre Festival of the Three Mules”!!! I’m not sure if the parade was dedicated to the mules, but there were three of them leading the parade….

As we were making our way up to the Montmartre “hill” we happened onto the parade viewing stand which was also where the parade would begin. Hundreds of costumed people were milling around and with different instruments tuning up, it was a great time watching just that. Also, before the parade began there was a stunt group that made several human pyramids climbing up each others backs until they were 5 or 6 “stories” tall. There were lots of cheers for this.

The parade was an exciting, festive affair with ‘wine tasting knighthoods’, ‘wine brotherhoods’, local growers (some of which were passing out wine samples), bands, and other beautifully costumed people.