La Cave aux Coquillages
by Wendy VanHatten
La Cave aux Coquillages in Fleury-la-Rivière is an underground museum and vineyard in France’s Champagne region.
The cave walls hold thousands of marine fossils that are approximately 45 million years old. During the Eocene epoch, the entire Champagne region was a warm, shallow tropical beach teeming with marine life.
The site is famously known for the Campanile giganteum, an extinct species of giant sea snail. Fossils of these massive shells, which measure between 40 and 60 cm (15–24 inches) long, can be seen naturally embedded right in the limestone.
The caves were excavated and transformed into an educational site by Patrice Legrand, a local winemaker and amateur paleontologist. He has dug out hundreds of meters of underground galleries beneath his working vineyard.
The thick layer of fossilized seashells embedded in the chalky soil is believed to be directly responsible for the minerality and unique terroir of the local Champagne.
Take a one and a half hour underground tour and learn about paleontology and how this relates to viticulture.
