Unforgettable Luxury and Relaxation at Loisium Wine & Spa Hotel

If you’ve been following along this summer, you know that Jason spent July in Spain teaching a management class while I stayed home to man the homestead. Typically, I go with him to Spain at some point while he’s teaching, but after my extreme sickness there last year, I’m having a little PTSD about Spain. I decided to just stay home in the humid, 100 degree, soul sapping spa environment of Missouri to deal with the acreage (garden booming, canning, the grass turning green again with massive storms, egg deliveries, making a t-shirt blanket, manning our 4 businesses, and all the craziness that is my regular non-traveling life) and instead meet him in France once he was done teaching for a new experience. Dare I call it, a vacation? I packed TWO swimsuits, so it was serious, whatever it was.

Let’s Get This Party Started

I flew out of Springfield at the beginning of August to meet Jason at the airport in Paris. In all our travels, we have yet to spend time in France, AND United had a great deal on reward flights to Paris this spring, so we abandoned our plans for the Alps (for this year) and booked flights to France.

My flight to Paris was FAR less eventful than Jason’s trip to Madrid (you can read about that here and here) since I only had one layover in Chicago. That layover was scheduled to be only an hour long and then we were delayed leaving Springfield! Eek! I got off the plane in Chicago with 13 minutes until boarding and basically walked right onto the plane to Paris. Whew! Made it! So did my bag, no idea how!

My flight from Chicago ended up being delayed as well for an hour once we were on the plane and about to take off (nothing like a “do not fly” maintenance light coming on when you’re sitting on the runway). So instead of waiting 5 hours in Paris for Jason, I was down to only 4. Works for me. Thankfully the rest of the flight was uneventful. I sat next to two gal pals headed to Paris for a month before they started their first after-college jobs (ahh youth). They sure had a lot of questions about travel and I was happy to help them out. Yay, I know things!

Once I was through border control and found my bag in Paris, I had used up about another hour. With only 3 hours left until Jason’s arrival, I spent the rest of my time writing, catching up on messages, making sure our new farm help was okay, and making sure all the transportation links in our trip were still going to work. Jason finally found me in Terminal One after flying into Terminal Two on Air France from Madrid in the early afternoon (in business class! More on that later). Then we were off to the train station for the first leg of our trip.

And We’re Off!

We grabbed the high-speed train at the airport TGV 2 station (booked ahead) and headed into the countryside immediately, in first class. Swanky. We got off at the Champagne-Ardennes TGV station just outside of Reims, which feels a bit like the middle of nowhere and has the longest ramp from the platforms up to the station that I’ve ever experienced. I was huffing and puffing by the time we made it to the top with our bags.

For the record, we packed WAY too much. Both of us. We’re so used to operating out of just a carry-on that we were both ridiculously overpacked. I swear I’m never checking a bag again. I bring too much stuff because I have space. And why did I even check one? Honestly, I have no idea. Although it did come in handy later on…

Luckily, we had planned ahead and had rented a car with Sixt, so we went off to find that. Turns out, there are ZERO signs for Sixt or any other rental car company at the train station. Thanks to my over-preparedness and Google Mapping everything before our trip, I had a pretty good idea where they were located, so we set off on an adventure to find them.

Come to find out (thank you Google reviews), the pickup location for Sixt is IN the B&B Hotel across the street from the train station. There are NO signs for Sixt anywhere outside or in that building, so just go to the front desk for the hotel and ask for your car and they’ll hand you your keys. You must book ahead at this location and pay online. While it was a bit frustrating that there were no signs, I have to say that picking up a car at a hotel is super convenient. Since the front desk is always open, technically, you can pick up your car no matter what time your train gets in. Plus, they just handed us the keys and made us sign a form – no back and forth about adding on unnecessary insurance (our reservation credit card has its own coverage) and other things we don’t need.

Don’t Trust the GPS

Once we had the car, we had no idea the adventure we were about to embark on to finish our journey to the hotel. We plugged in the hotel address into the GPS – it seemed the correct general area – so we headed down the road, blindly trusting the GPS and chatting about our flights. This meant we ended up in the middle of a vineyard (gorgeous) on rock roads with huge ruts in a car clearly not meant for off-roading. Should have paid extra for the SUV upgrade. *shrug* Whoopsie.

Two cautions if you ever head for this hotel.

1. Look at the GPS route before you leave, not just the destination.

2. Do NOT go through the tunnel in Mutigny, it heads straight for the vineyards and their rocky, rutted access roads. Instead, drive through the town and stay on the paved roads.

Shockingly, we didn’t blow any fancy high-performance tires on our Audi. We got high-centered once (oops) and had to back down the insanely steep hill to completely reroute ourselves to get back on the paved road. By this point, I was delirious from a lack of sleep and this entire situation was hilarious (upon reflection). I suggested just pushing our little car up the hill a few times since we seemed so hopelessly lost in the vineyard maze and we could SEE the hotel but not get to it. Jason was less amused but stayed fairly positive. I did actually get out of the car at one point to move some big rocks. Hahaha! We eventually found the way back to the paved roads and lo and behold – a paved road went right to the hotel! In our defense, we’re pretty sure we passed another car – in the vineyard – that had done the same thing, so it wasn’t just us!

Once we finally got to the hotel, we may or may not have sat on the patio giggling at the other travelers trying to drive through the vineyards. However, many of them made it up the insanely steep and rocky hill and actually got to the hotel that way! We didn’t thanks to the car’s low profile. What’s even more funny is, typically, we rent with Hertz and get an SUV upgrade from them since we have President’s Circle status. However, we have yet to run into a time we actually needed the SUV (even in Scotland), but this time…of course that’s not what we booked and we could have actually used it! Figures.

We Found It!

We finally found our hotel – Loisium Wine & Spa Hotel at the top of a hill, completely surrounded by champagne vineyards. My Iowa farm girl self couldn’t help but think the rolling hills of vines looked an awful lot like the rolling hills of corn where I am from. It felt very much like Iowa, which is probably why we settled in so quickly.

We booked a Prestige Double Room that gave us a view of the vineyards, but no private balcony. While the room was comfortable, it was very dark and a bit cramped. We had trouble finding a place to open our bags to organize the plethora of unnecessary things we packed. The entire color scheme of the hotel was in tans, black, grays, and natural light. While this gave a sense of calm, it wasn’t super practical for seeing what you packed in the depths of your bag.

Let’s Get Some Grub!

Once we found and steamed some clothes that weren’t dowsed in airport grime, we headed to the hotel’s restaurant for dinner, as we had reservations on the first and last nights of our stay. Anywhere we could on this trip, I booked into the hotel’s restaurant on our first night after a busy day of travel because I knew we would be tired from navigating an unfamiliar world. Of course, this meant we spent more money than we typically would for a meal for convenience, but the goal of this trip was to relax, so we tried to make things easy. And the food was fantastic!

We ate from the bar menu the other two nights we stayed here. This was about half the price of eating in the restaurant for us, but still more than we would have liked to spend. I will say this though, we never had a bad meal. The food was phenomenal for ALL our meals and we always walked away full.

Each morning there was a HUGE breakfast buffet with everything you can imagine for options. I had no problem staying dairy-free and I even saw a few gluten-free options (but I can eat wheat bread in Europe, so didn’t have to worry about this). Plus there were plenty of vegetarian and even vegan options – I think almost anyone could eat here since it seemed like they were accommodating many different diets.

Finding a Routine

On day two we decided to go for a walk in the vineyards after breakfast before checking out the spa. The year-old hotel is literally surrounded by vineyards as far as you can see, and the farmers don’t mind you strolling through the vines if only you look and don’t touch. This became part of our morning routine and we managed to get some really cool drone footage flying over the vines. Watch for it on Instagram and YouTube.

The next item on our daily agenda involved early afternoon champagne (obviously since we’re in Champagne) and snacks from the hotel bar after our walk. They had amazing snack options, and we became huge fans of the white sausage and fries. After our snack, we would wander back to our room, change into our swimsuits and robes, and head to the spa. Included in our stay was access to the hotel’s THREE saunas and pool. I felt so fancy.

Each sauna in the spa operates at a different temperature and humidity. The humidity and aromatherapy of the Hammam sauna were a particular favorite since Jason was fighting off a bug he caught in Spain (we truly have the worst luck staying healthy in Spain) and it helped to clear his lungs and suppress his cough. It’s funny that we spent so much time in the Hammam because the heat and humidity were exactly what we were trying to escape from in Missouri!

We spent less time in the dry saunas but still utilized them. One operated at 75-100 degrees C – that’s 182-232 degrees F! It felt a bit like we were slow-roasting. I think we only used that once. Otherwise, we spent some time in the sauna operating at 45-75 degrees C (122-182 degrees F). I loved the whole sauna experience and felt so revived after each session. I’m thinking I need a sauna in my life. *adds to Christmas list*

We didn’t get in the hotel’s pool until the very last day. It was actually quite cool, cloudy, and rainy our entire stay, and the pool itself was not heated, so it was pretty shocking to get in the water. The sun finally came out on our last day, so we decided to brave the water and it was really refreshing. Once we were in the water, we didn’t mind the cold and got a fair number of laps in before getting out for a little sunbaking before we went back inside for spa snacks and a nap. Yes, this was really our lives.

Oh yes, there were spa naps every day on their comfy little plush beds overlooking the vineyards. It was pretty lush and heavenly and not our typical style. So nice.

You Know Those Things They Tell You Not to Do…

On our last full day in Champagne, we took a bit of a risk and took off to find a champagne house we had been invited to visit via Instagram. Typically, I just ignore any spammy-looking communication we get there, but this message caught my eye because the owner invited us via a comment on a post that wasn’t about France. He had seen a story I had posted about the vineyards in Champagne and did a little work to comment on a different post on our page, so I looked him up!

His champagne and the tasting tour had glowing reviews, many of them also mentioning being contacted via Instagram. Okay, maybe we won’t get kidnapped. Let’s go check this out! We ended up having the best time, learned a ton, and it landed in the top three things we did on this trip. We’ll tell you more about Champagne Gardet and the charming little village of Chigny-les-Roses next week. It was that good. Thanks, Francois!

Time to Pack it Up

After four nights, tons of food, walks, and spa time, it was time for us to check out, return the car, and get back on the train for our journey to Tours for the second leg of our trip.

We had a few hours between checkout and when our train left, so we decided to drive into Epernay to visit Rue du Champagne and the big, fancy, well-known champagne houses. Unfortunately, many of them were closed due to most of France being on holiday in August. Only Moet & Chandon (home of Dom Perignon) was open for tours and shopping. We ducked into the shop but didn’t go on the tour since we didn’t have much time. Um no…we didn’t buy any. The price was a bit steep.

We wandered up and down the Av de Champagne in Epernay admiring the buildings before finally heading back to our car after about an hour.

We headed back towards the train station but stopped to grab a sandwich on the way. It seemed the French thing to do. We ate our sandwiches quickly before dropping our keys off at the hotel’s front desk and dragging our bags back up the hill to the train station. Yes, dragging; at this point, one of the wheels on Jason’s suitcase was nearly falling off which made things…challenging.

Our train was over an hour late, which put us in a bit of a panic about making it to Tours in time to pick up our next car there and get to the next hotel before our dinner reservation. Despite this, that leg ended up being our favorite. Yes, even better than spa life. I can’t wait to tell you about it in a couple of weeks!