Crillon le Brave, the French village-turned-hotel

“Oh, what a friend we have in cheeses .” I can’t remember who said it or where I saw the quote – on a greetings card or a tank top? – but right now the words are suspended in a thought bubble above my husband’s head. We’re standing in Hôtel Crillon le Brave’s mind-blowing 17th-century wine cellar, halfway through a marathon cheese-and-wine tasting, and nobody is saying a word.

My husband, Piers, France’s leading maître fromager, Roland Barthélemy, and the hotel’s sommelier, Benoit Liebus, are locking eyes across an upturned barrel laden with stinking gems in what appears to be a non-hostile cheese-off. “Do you know, I think Le Secret de Ginette  is superior both to the Picodon Fermier and the 18-week-old
Picodon Méthode Dieulefit?” Piers eventually announces. “Give me a slab of that and a glass of Château La Nerthe and I’m happy.

I mean, what else could a man possibly want in life?” There’s a nervous clearing of throats from the French. “Oh, her?” my husband chuckles, raising an eyebrow in my direction. “Don’t worry: she knows her place in the pecking order.”

That I do. Which is why, from the moment we pull up outside the Vaucluse hotel set on a hilltop overlooking olive groves east of Avignon, I decide not to view cheese as a rival but rather a cursory acquaintance that I was finally going to get the chance to know a lot better. Because although the hotel is a favourite with walkers, cyclists (who like to have a go at the “Géant de Provence”  nearby) and antiquarians (it’s a short and very pretty drive to L’Isle-sur-la-Sorgue , which holds a giant antiques and flea market every Sunday), there’s scarcely any need to step outside the cobble-stoned confines of this self-contained village with its three very different restaurants.
Alberghi diffusi – historical villages turned into hotels – have been springing up across Italy for decades, but aside from the famous Moulin de l’Abbaye in Brantôme, Crillon le Brave is the most notable in France. A more ambitious project than the Moulin (which is made up of only three buildings), the hotel is made up of eight grand 17th- and 18th-century homes, many bearing the names of former inhabitants. Although not as old as the medieval Castelvetere in Campania, or as sprawling as Tuscany’s Borgo Giusto,  Crillon has much of the same appeal, feeling more like a discreet community than a hotel.

Our suite – situated opposite the beautiful church of Saint Romain  – feels so like a cosy and unpretentious rented Provençal cottage that we’re happy to spend the (admittedly short) spells in between eating, digesting and planning our next meal there. In a traditional hotel, no matter how luxurious, there’s something suffocating and demeaning about the reminders from above, below and next door (the TV and plumbing noises and fiddling with keycards) that you are one of many visitors, probably engaged in not dissimilar things. Whereas, scattered in a village, you feel as if you’re among only a handful of people staying.

Granted, this is probably because we are the only ones who have checked in with the sole intention of laying down fat reserves. Certainly, the only ones who choose to forego day trips to Gordes or the Lubéron , Châteauneuf-du-Pape  or Vaison la Romaine  to see the Roman antiquities, in favour of sitting on the terrace, looking out at the vineyards and breathing in the scent of lavender.

While my husband wades, knee-deep, through a series of semi-liquid cheeses, I accompany my daughter down a few steps to see her first real castle, the privately owned Château de Crillon, before planning my next meal.

The problem, and the beauty, of such sumptuous alberghi diffusi is that you’re disinclined to explore some of the real functioning villages around (the ones without room service and five-star spas). We do once manage a quick trip to the truffle market  in nearby Carpentras  (where Piers also buys up most of cheesemeister Barthélemy’s famous fromagerie, Vigier). But every other pleasure and indulgence is available at the hotel: our daily game of boules by the pool, our massage at the Spa des Ecuries , housed in 18th-century stables .

“Do you think we should have been more adventurous?” I wonder aloud on the final day. “I mean, there basically isn’t a dud town within 100 miles – and we didn’t even manage to drive 10 minutes to the quarries in Bedoin .”

“If adventure is what you’re after,” my husband retorts, looking up for a second from the menu, “we could always nip back to the cheese shop and get a few more of those Petit Chèvres de Provence . It’ll mean we’ll have to check our bags in on the way back, though,” he warns. One eye on his abdomen, it occurs to me that the excess baggage I’m most concerned about won’t be going in the hold.
Source: Telegraph