A community trip to Pierre Richard's estate, Gruissan

The short version: the trip is on, the date is not

We are putting together a group to visit Pierre Richard’s wine estate outside Narbonne — the actor Russian speakers know as “the tall blond man”. The plan was to go for a signing session: from time to time he signs bottles at the estate in person, and getting into one of those sessions costs nothing.

Right now the trip is on hold, and we would rather say so plainly. The estate’s official website (vinspierrerichard.com, checked on 17 August 2026) carries this notice: “Pour des raisons de santé, les séances de dédicaces prévues pour l’été 2026 ont été annulées” — for health reasons, the signing sessions planned for summer 2026 have been cancelled. July is addressed separately: “Mr Pierre Richard ne pourra pas être présent lors des dédicaces prévues au mois de juillet… Nous vous tiendrons informé quant à une éventuelle reprise de celles-ci au mois d’août” — the estate promises to let people know if the sessions start again.

So we are not promising anyone a meeting with the actor, and we are not fixing a date. We are waiting for the signing sessions to reappear on the estate’s schedule, and the moment they do we will announce the day of the trip in the chat. In the chat itself it was put more briefly: once there’s a schedule, we pick a day and off we go.

What the place actually is

The estate is called Domaine de l’Évêque, at Route des Salins, 11430 Gruissan. That is the département of Aude, between two coastal lagoons a few kilometres from Narbonne. It covers 50 hectares of garrigue and vines, works within the Corbières appellation — specifically its seaside part, Corbières maritimes — and describes its farming as “agriculture raisonnée” with HVE level 3 certification (Haute Valeur Environnementale; level three is the top tier of that French environmental certification for farms).

The output is split into three ranges the estate calls Vins d’auteur, Vins à succès (oak-aged) and Vins populaires. We are not going to describe, rate or recommend any of it: this page is about a group trip and about the place, not about tasting.

One practical detail worth knowing in advance: the estate’s tasting cellar (caveau) is open every day, Sundays included, from 10:00 to 13:00 and from 15:00 to 19:00. In other words there is a midday break, so turning up at one in the afternoon is pointless — come before thirteen or after fifteen. The estate’s website exists in French, English and Russian, so checking the schedule or writing to them does not require French. That was in fact the first practical thought in the chat: if a whole group is coming, it makes sense to warn the estate by email in advance.

Where it is and how long the drive takes

Gruissan is a seaside commune in the Aude, past Narbonne if you are coming from Montpellier. The drive takes roughly an hour and a half: the A9 down to Narbonne, then local roads out to the coast. The motorway section is tolled — apart from fuel, that is the only unavoidable expense on the way.

Public transport is awkward here. A train will get you to Narbonne, but you still have to cover the distance from the station to Route des Salins, and local bus timetables on this coast change from season to season, so they need checking for the specific day. That is why we drive: an hour and a half each way instead of half a day with connections.

How our car-pool trips work

The community has run this format many times and this trip is no different. First the chat collects a list: who wants to come, who has a car and who doesn’t. Then the drivers take passengers, and fuel and tolls are divided among everyone on the trip — “we’ll split the petrol between everyone taking part”, as the organiser put it.

When the list was being collected one car was already full, so the chat was looking for more drivers: every additional car means three or four more people who can come. And if more carless people sign up than there are seats, there is a fallback that was agreed in advance: if enough people without cars turn up, we rent a car for the day and go anyway. In that case the rental is shared equally as well.

None of this is binding and nothing is paid up front: a list of interested people is a list, not a booking. That is precisely why we are waiting for the estate’s schedule before inviting anyone for a specific day.

What it costs

Taking part in the signing session itself is free — it is run by the estate, not by us, and entry costs nothing. The only money involved is travel: fuel and the toll, divided among everyone in the car. If a rental car turns out to be necessary, it is split the same way.

Nobody collects money in advance and the community has no cash box — we settle up afterwards, on the actual receipts. That is the normal arrangement for our meet-ups: the events themselves are free, and shared costs (meat for a barbecue, a boat hire, an entry ticket) are divided evenly and honestly.

About the community

“Vibe Sud France” is a free, volunteer-run Russian-speaking community in the south of France, around 400 people in one chat. The core is Montpellier, but people write in and turn up from all over Occitanie and the Côte d’Azur. We run barbecues for a hundred people, hikes, beach days, trips out to sea, ice skating in winter and group excursions like this one; none of it is sold — it all rests on whoever feels like organising something.

Every past meet-up is collected in the community events timeline, and how the whole thing works from the inside is on the about the community page. Most of us are in Montpellier, but the map is much wider than that: there is a separate overview of the Russian-speaking community across the south of France, and practical addresses and contacts live in our own directory.

Gruissan sits in the Aude, the same département as Narbonne and Carcassonne; driving down from Montpellier you pass Béziers, where we also have people. Group trips to neighbouring towns are routine for us: that is how we went to the Escale à Sète maritime festival and on the hike up to the Montferrand castle — both times exactly like this, in shared cars with passengers picked up along the way.