Kermit often told me to look where no one else is looking! The far northern tip of the Médoc, where the Gironde estuary dominates the climate and the semi-forested upper left bank of Bordeaux falls into the Atlantic, shrouded in fog, seemed to be one such place. Here I found a two-hundred-year-old formerly active stone lighthouse surrounded by Cabernet Sauvignon vines...

Being a vigneron in the Hautes-Alpes, a tiny wine region in the shadow of some of France’s highest peaks, is no easy feat: in 2024, Mickaël Olivon had to contend with a damaging late frost, then right as harvest approached, a ravenous flock of birds descended upon his garden-sized vineyards and further pecked away at his yield. Mickaël’s story is an unusual one...