Le Mas Duclaux is a 12 hectare estate situated in the southern part of the Rhône Valley, just north of Avignon and across the river from Châteauneuf-du-Pape. Founded in 2006, the domaine includes 5 hectares of Tavel, an all-rosé Appellation Contrôlée that was reputedly the favorite wine of Louis XIV. The winemaker is Benoît Duclaux, who initially trained as a chef and worked under Alain Ducasse. Benoît runs the estate with his wife Nathalie, who descends from five generations of Tavel “royalty”, including her great-great grandfather, Aimé Roudil, who first defined the boundaries of the Tavel wine region in 1838.
To fashion his Tavel, Benoît employs a blend of 40% Grenache Noir and Blanc, 25% Syrah, 15% Cinsault, 10% Clairette, and 10% Bourboulenc. The vineyards are farmed according to a regimen of lutte raisonée, which is essentially organic, over various soils including limestone, to sand, and “galets roulés”, the smooth round stones renowned in Châteauneuf-du-Pape. The grapes are destemmed and cold macerated for 36-48 hours, then separately fermented in tank before being blended together in stainless steel tanks and aged for 4-6 months.
Most Akha villages are built directly on the side of a mountain. They compensate for this in two ways. Either they build the floor out of bamboo and suspend it like a deck on bamboo stilts. Or they use retaining walls to level the ground and build directly on the dirt instead of on stilts. At first, I really hoped to get a stilted house. I thought “Yuck, I couldn't stand living on dirt floors!”. Well, sure enough... we got a dirt floor. Luckily, after a day or two, I found that it wasn't so bad after all. And when we saw how they build the stilt houses, we decided that we're glad to be on solid ground! But, I digress, what I really wanted to tell you about was the art of having a dirt floor.
After we'd been in the village about 4 days, my closest neighbor, Bu-saw, decided it was time to treat the floors. In order to keep the dust down, the Akha wet the ground and pack it hard... so hard in fact, that after a while, you can actually sweep it! So, Bu-Saw and some village boys started trekking the 200 meters down the hill to fill up their water jugs and then proceeded to make a mud pit out of my living room! Now don't misunderstand me... the “mud pit” wasn't a negative thing. In fact, quite the opposite. We had a wonderful time stomping around in the mud and getting thoroughly dirty. After we finished, she told me that I'd have to let it dry and then do the whole process another 2 or 3 times before the floor would be finished. Phew! Who knew dirt floors would be so much work! But in the end, we're so grateful that God has provided new friends like Bu-Saw who are willing to teach us all the ins and outs of village life when we don't have a clue!
Recently I've been thinking about how much you (our beloved readers) still don't know about our lives in Thailand! Even after three years of blogging, we haven't begun to scratch the surface of all the interesting things we see and do on a daily basis. So, I'm hoping to start blogging a bit more about everyday topics (in addition to the special events and stories that we already try to post) to help help you better understand our lives and ministry to the Akha. I've often been asked how I bathe in the village, so I thought I'd give you a step by step tutorial on the process! When I first arrived in the village, I had no idea how to shower at the public wells and had to walk about a mile to our Akha mom's house to bathe in her indoor bathroom. Luckily, some of the young women in the village took pity on me and taught me all the ins and outs of bathing modestly in public! Of course, with our new house (We promise a video tour of the finished house is coming soon!) we have an indoor bathroom, so indoor bucket showers are also possible. However, I actually enjoy being outside and have become quite accustomed to showering like this, so I still prefer sarong showers (weather permitting).
More good progress this last week on the house. It's slow, but steady. The sod was put in and some of the carpet, as well as the backsplash in the kitchen. There's been quite a bit of touch up around the house and the outside looks kind of bad at the moment since there are so many spots that still need paint. Next week should be wood floors and we're excited to take some neat inside shots soon. Less than 3 weeks until we move in!
Here's a picture of our master shower. It's getting close to being finished, but still needs the corner shelves and glass enclosure.