RuvidaMente
With the exception of the Morvan and the particularly rainy "Montagne" area, the climate of Burgundy, like all the rest of Western Europe, is characterized by influences from the West. In the winter months, the weather is often nice, although with rather cold temperatures.
In summer, light rains cool down the mainly muggy days. The most beautiful season in Burgundy, however, is autumn, with clear days and dry weather.
Burgundy is marked by a succession of different landscapes. In the Morvan, ancient and impermeable soils prevail, while in the Côte d'Or there is a succession of karst plateaus which are counterpointed by the fertile flat areas of the Auxerre area.
The plateaus of the upper Côte d'Or have average altitudes of 1500 ft above sea level which, in an easterly direction, descend to 1000 ft above sea level and then, in the Saône valley, take on the form of an uninterrupted series of valleys called "combes".
Burgundy is a region made up of four departments: Côte d'Or, with its capital Dijon, Nièvre, with its capital Nevers, Saône-et-Loire, with its capital Mâcon, and Yonne, with its capital Auxerre.
The northern part of Burgundy (Sens) is located 60 miles from Paris, while the southern part is only 45 miles from Lyon.
Burgundy is a region easy to access, thanks to the road that crosses it, but it is also full of small roads that lead into the most fascinating and secret corners of its territory.
Among the alternative routes, try the road that from Tournous reaches the Grosne valley to the west, heading towards Ozenay. Or the wine roads that start, respectively, from Cluny (signposted as "Route de la Pierre et du Vin") and Veugeot (signposted as "Route des Grand Crus").
The itineraries that follow the course of the rivers are also full of charm, such as the Cousin near Avallon, and the Serein downstream of Chablis.
The waterways of Burgundy, born for trade, have become the paradise of an alternative and unique holiday.
More than a 600 miles, between navigable rivers and canals, allow you to travel through Burgundy along unusual and exciting itineraries, both by making cruises of a few days aboard "péniche-hotels" equipped with every comfort, and by trying your hand at the helm of real houseboats that can be rented for longer periods, but which in the summer months must be booked well in advance.
The wineyards are the great wealth of Burgundy. From them are obtained world-famous wines, great reds from the Pinot Noir vine, and whites from the Chardonnay vine. The area of choice for red wines is the "Côte" which from Chagny to Dijon dominates the Plaine for a length of 40 miles.
Divided into a multitude of small properties, the Côte has an original appearance with its dry stone walls that hold the land above the slopes.
From the Côte de Nuits (from Gevrey to Beaune) come vigorous wines such as Chambertin and Clos Veugeot, while Côte de Beaune produces more delicate wines, such as Pommard and Volnay, among the reds, and Mersault and Montrachet, among the whites.
Burgundy has experienced alternating events for centuries that have enlarged and narrowed its accordion boundaries until, following the Treaty of Verdun (843), the first nucleus of the Duchy of Burgundy was formed.
From that moment on, its history was a succession of events in which war exploits and dynastic entanglements led this land to extend from the Jura to the North Sea, even incorporating Flanders and threatening the crown of France itself.
This epic came to an abrupt end in 1477, when Charles the Bold lost his life in battle under the walls of Nancy, leaving his daughter Marie as the sole heir and thus offering Louis XI an easy opportunity to reunite the duchy and county of Burgundy under his rule.
The Middle Ages, for better or for worse, gave rise to a great spiritual adventure that involved the whole West and had its origins in Cluny, in the heart of Burgundy, where the largest and most beautiful church in Christianity stood and one of the largest monasteries, capable of hosting, at the time, up to a thousand monks at the same time.
From here, the order of Cluny extended far beyond France, reaching Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Italy, England and even Poland.
Even today, in Burgundy alone, the vestiges of the Saint-Fortunat priory in Charlieu, the abbey of Saint-Germain d'Auxerre, the Sacré-Coeur in Paray-le-Monial, Saint-Marcel in Chalon-sur-Saône, Sainte-Madeleine in Vézelay and Notre-Dame de la Charité-sur-Loire remain glorious witnesses.
That of the great abbots of Cluny, completely independent of any temporal power, and often superior to popes and kings in terms of influence, was then followed by the entirely spiritual season of the Cistercian monks, culminating with the foundation of the abbey of Fontenay by St. Bernard.
The Romanesque imprint is the distinctive element of the highest expressions of Burgundy art.
The cradle of the Romanesque movement was the abbey of St. Benigno, in Dijon, begun in 1001, followed immediately after by the church of St-Vorles in Châtillon-sur-Saône and that of Cluny, the first vaulted church, of size equal to St. Peter's in Rome, considered among the most beautiful monuments of Christianity until it was overwhelmed and destroyed by the events that followed the French Revolution.
The triumph of Romanesque art was accompanied by a luxurious multiplication of refined decorations which, with their excesses, ended up provoking the reaction identified in the Cistercian reform, inspired by artistic criteria of evangelical purity, which took shape in the introduction, first here and then throughout the Christian West, of the Gothic style.
From the mid-seventeenth century onwards, the pivot of the economy of Burgundy was the supply of timber to the city of Paris, which is responsible for the creation of its dense network of canals.
Timber was soon joined by wines and excellent agro-industrial products (Bresse poultry, Charolais cattle, farms, etc.), which still represent, together with tourism, one of the most important items in the region's economy.
Currently, an intense promotional campaign is underway, focused on the geographical centrality of Burgundy, equidistant from all the major European financial and industrial capitals and excellently served by communication routes, aimed at attracting foreign investments.
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