Last week I had the great privilege to be taken on a visit to the Champagne region of Northern France by Carlsberg and Moet Hennessey.  The trip was for as many of our hotel managers who could go so the five of us from the southern hotels leapt at the chance.

We flew from Exeter Airport (another first) to Paris where we met up with Kevin from Moet, then a quick transfer to Reims and our hotel.  We managed to find a restaurant that was willing to stay open for us and we managed a great steak at around 11.30pm to start the trip off.  I must admit that after a long day travelling Jason and I preferred to start dinner with a local beer but it wasn’t long before Kevin started to explore his way around the champagnes on the list and we tried a couple later on with dinner.

This really set the tone for the next two days - breakfast was the only meal that we didn’t have champagne with!  Monday morning took us to Krug, this is a much smaller and more traditional champagne house, very much haute couture as our guide told us.  We tried a two of their wines which were lovely and were top of my list for the trip.

Lunch was at a local brasserie, excellent food in a simple way in a relaxed atmosphere, all the staff were good fun but also knew their stuff.  Pink champagne with lunch today!

The afternoon visit was to Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin, this is a much larger operation than Krug and to continue the clothing analogy crossing between haute couture and pret a porter and very much at the top end of the ready to wear market.  The real highlight of this visit was meeting up with one of the senior winemakers and tasting the still, young wines that go to make up the blend.  I knew it was a skillful job before I went but now I underestand just how specialised it is:  the grapes form the different parcels of vineyards are vinified separately by location and grape type.  Tasting these wines unmatured was a real eyeopener as to their different characteristics and role in the end result.  Each year the starting off wines are different but the end result has to end up the same - allowing for blending with some reserve wine and then maturing for a few years in the bottles.  These guys tase 20 wines a day, 4 days a week for 3 months to get the balance right.

Dinner that night was a formal dinner with Veuve Clicquot at one of their houses near Epernay - a stunning evening in a real old wine makers chateau with all the French style you would expect.  We had different champagnes with the different courses, starting with the Grande Dame and canapes.  The menu planning happens in reverse with these dinners.  Normally the chef will right the menu and then the the sommelier will choose the wines.  Here the wines are chosen and then a menu written to go with them!  The last wine, a demi sec, was decanted.  This may seem a rather odd thing to do with a fizzy white wine but there are two reasons for this: it is done in honour of the Grande Dame herself as in the early days of champagne making all wines had to be decanted because they hadn’t worked out the remuage / degorgement technique then to remove the sediment and also to remove some of the fizz - after having had a lovely dinner with champagne at every course it is a good idea to get rid of some of the bubbles…..

We had a bit of a break on the Tuesday morning with the opportunity to have a look at Reims Cathedral.  This is a stunning building - it is where all but 2 of the French kings were crowned and it really looks and feels that grand.  Andrea managed to find a specialist chocolate shop and bakers too - not only spot it on the way up to the cathedral but find it again on the way back!

Another lovely lunch at La Table Kobus in Epernay - a choice of menus including one with chocolate in every course.  As the phrase goes “it had to be done” so I had a duck terrine with knobs of chocolate in, bream dusted with cocoa before being pan fried then a 72% chocolate creme brulee to finish.  We tried some Pol Roger to start with then moved on to some still wines just for a change.

That afternoon took us to Moet & Chandon, by far the biggest of the houses where we had anither amusing and informative tour, learning different things as we went.  The amazing fact from here was that in their cellars they have well over 3 million bottles of wine!

After this it was the trip back to the airport and the flight back home and an overnight at The Grand, far too late to start driving back to Cornwall then.  Going back to work the next day was a bit of a let down but I suppose if you were drinking champagne all the time it might lose some of it’s appeal!

A big thank you goes to Kevin from Moet for all his hospitality and also to David and Phil from Carlsberg for organising the event and looking after us on the way.  Looking forward to the next trip!!

One piece of good news that I was greeted with on my return from holiday was that Kristin has been succesful in getting her “unlimited leave to remain” in the UK.  She has been with us for a number of years now (with a couple of breaks) and has had to apply a couple of times previously for visa / work permit extensions.

Two years ago Kristin was able to apply for a two year extension and in this she was very well supported by many of our regular guests as well as our local MP and other people in the community.  Once this period was up she had to apply for her permanent leave to stay, part of this was her citizenship test which was quite challenging - I learned quite a lot while helping her revice - and then a full application with all the supporting statements.  This was quite a challenging and worrying time for Kristin and Mark but thankfully it came back positive and they can stay.

It really is good for us to see the system working well and somebody who wants to stay and is making a contribution to the local and national economies is allowed to.  We all look forward to seeing them here for a lot longer.

Not old in terms of age though!  This evening Sian, who was one of our senior receptionists until she could resist the call of The Valleys no more, brought her mum in for dinner as a Mothering Sunday treat.  It was really good to catch up with Sian and her mum, I’ve hardly seen either of them since Sian left and most of the team here haven’t seen a lot of her either.  Many of them chat regularly on facebook and MSN but it’s not the same as meeting face to face.

They had some exciting news too as Sian’s brother Andrew became a dad again today - a little brother for Rhys.  Andrew and Rosie had been told they were going to have a little girl but out popped a boy!  No news on names yet but with strong Welsh connections in the family and being born on the 1st of March my money’s on “David” being in the mix somewhere.

After Sian and Joy had finished dinner they called at Reception for a brief chat and stayed for quite a while - Joy only dragging Sian off when her phone kept telling her it was out of battery, quite essential when they want to catch up on the family news.

Sian and Damien are now settled in Cwmbran, Sian working for acompany that makes promotional sweets.  If any of you remember Sian and want to pass on any messages (apart from orders for sweets) do please let me know.

It is a long while since my last post but I do have a good reason - I was on holiday!  We managed to have a good break over half term skiing and snowboarding in Switzerland, Val and I carried on with skiing but Rachael and Tom learnt to snowboard and after the usual frustrations of learning something new they really got going and went down a few black runs at the end of the week.  Engelberg is a fantastic wintersports location with almost guaranteed snow - we even had our own glacier at 3000 metres!

Once we got back home I had another week off to catch up on domestic things - all the washing and a few other bits around the house and garden but I was ready to come back to work once my time was up!

I’ve been back a couple of days now and managing to catch up with all the enquiries and letters, a few more to do yet but nearly there.  I must say that the team did a very good job looking after the hotel while I was away, especially as it was a very busy time for them.

Now we start the second planning phase for this year - we have a Christmas meeting tomorrow!

Last night I was invited to the re-opening party at Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant following its £2.5M redevelopment, the reason for my near guilt was that I was leaving a full hotel and a very busy restaurant behind.  I didn’t worry about the team here as I’d seen the planning and organisation they’d put in and they had a really good night.  Not as good as mine though! 

The new Seafood Restaurant is stunning and the work Rick, Jill and Rupert have done with the design team is fantastic.  I was expecting a glass of fizz and some canapes but found out during the week that we were being treated to dinner from the full menu, guinea pigs Rick Stein said when he welcomed us!  The new set up works really well and I would wholeheartedly recommend anyone go and have a look when in Padstow, I guess Rick would prefer it if you ate as well as just looking!

I am sure there will be some new photos on their web site soon but as the builders only finished yesterday afternoon it has been a bit too quick for them to get the pictures done yet - look out for the statue of Chalky!

Here’s a link to Rick’s website:

http://www.rickstein.com/

If your thinking of visiting Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant or visiting Padstow, why not stay at the Metropole Hotel.

http://the-metropole.co.uk/

OK so I’m borrowing the title from Ewen McGregor’s road trips but this is more news on the cycle ride to work.  I took 8 thorns out of my front tyre last week, fixed two big holes and the tyre has still gone down again!  I asked in the bike shop when I bought a new puncture repair kit if he had been selling lots of these and inner tubes and he said yes.  I also asked Gary in Bridge Bike Hire if he had had lots of trouble too and sure enough he had. 

This prompted me to get my road bike out and come the long way to work along the road through Little Petherick.  Some of it is easier as it is a decent enough road surface but the hill up from the river in Little Petherick is quite hard.  I am also doing this as I have to build up my last bit of strength for my skiing holiday in a week and a half’s time.  OK it is a case of too little too late but I have to try!  I even went home around the diversion route through Winnards Perch last night.  It is almost twice as far but it does mean I miss out on the steep hill.  I may try that one tonight again, it depends on what time I can get away.  Whichever way I go I must make sure I have something to eat before I go.

With a couple of other appointments over the next few days I will only be able to ride the bike in twice more before I go away, I just hope I’ve done enough work to keep skiing all week - there is a 12k run from the top of the mountain right to the bottom that i want to do once while I’m away.  I’ll let you know how I get on!

Sue, my housekeeper, has had to have a few months off due to a really painful hip.  The good news is that she managed to get her operation booked in for last Friday, the better news was that she didn’t have to have a full replacement  done and the best news is that she was able to come home yesterday!

We wish her well for her recovery and look forward to seeing her back at work soon.

I felt I must follow up yesterday’s post - the front tyre was fine, I kept an eye on it all day and no trouble, just when I went to go home the back tyre was as flat as a pancake!  I managed to fix that one and set off home but the road way, not along the trail as I didn’t want to pick up any more flats.  The front lasted halfway home and I had to stop a couple more times to blow it up and then had to give up and walk the last mile home - I just have to think of it as extra exercise.

Today is my first day back on my bike since before Christmas.  I had a flat tyre and managed to find all sorts of excuses for not fixing it such as it’s almost Christmas and I’ll need to go in the car anyway or taking things to and from work for meetings but on Monday I fixed the puncture and got back on today (yes, I know it’s Wednesday today, I had an excuse for yesterday too and not the weather).  Despite the approach of spring and lighter mornings it was still dark all of the way in so I was a bit apprehensive about running into the regular dog walkers out on the trail.  I did manage to spot them all - thankfully some of the dogs are quite light in colour, it makes it easier, and so got here in one piece and only with wet feet from all the puddles.

I put my bike away when I got here and noticed a piece of grass stuck on the front tyre - it didn’t come off easily: it’s a thorn thouroughly embedded in my front tyre so I guess I’ll have to fix that before I can go home tonight!  I was talking to Ash when I got in this morning, he cycles in from Wadebridge too and he has had another puncture recently as well.  He did tell me that the trail managers had been out trimming the hedges on Monday  which is why all the extra debris is on the trail.  We’ll just have to hope all the rain washes all the rubbish off the trail, not back on to it!

This was my attempts to encourage some of my management team before we all headed off to The Grand last Sunday for our annual Departmental and Senior Managers Conference.  This is the fourth time we have run this event and since the arrival of our Group HR Manager we General Managers have been taking part rather than leading the groups.

This is a great opportunity for us all to meet up, some of us do get together fairly often but we don’t get to meet up with the guys from our northern hotels that frequently and it is good to keep in touch and to remember we are all part of the same group.

Alan and Jason had some help with this year’s event from some students from South Devon College who were doing their Events Module.  They had planned all the activities for us and then facilitated the sessions which were generally much more fun than previous years.  The theme for this year was thinking more laterally about solving guests issues and developing our businesses and we certainly had to do that.  The one activity that most of us were looking forward to the least was the dance workshop.  There are quite a few of us who think we have two left feet and no natural sense of rhythm and we weren’t proved wrong!  What we did learn was that with a bit of effort and some good guidance we could do things that we wouldn’t have tried if left to our own devices.

Quite a few photos were taken of the event and they have all been put on our server for general viewing.  Andrea did find one picture of me and her Deputy Manager during the blindfolded walk exercise.  It looks like we have just been parked in the lobby and left!

As well as all the different exercises we also had a lot of fun, after dinner on the first night a few of us managed to have an impromptu game of pictionary with a flip chart borrowed from the syndicate room next door and some scrap paper.  This was fun for us and also for some of the other guests who must have been wondering what an earth we were up to.

The Gala Dinner on the last night was good too, Gareth the new chef did a fantastic job with a confit duck and foie gras terrine to start, a celeriac capuccino to follow and then fillet of lamb which was lovely and pink.  To finish us all off we had a hot chocolate fondant - glad we didn’t have to do any more dance classes after all that!  Sally, who had run the dance classes, did us a cabaret after dinner with her dance troupe which was a fun way to finish off the conference.

Now we just have to make sure we bring back what we have learnt and put it into practice!