LUDON-MEDOC, France, Oct 7, 2007 (AFP) - In a white skirt and sandals, a young American, secateurs in hand, is busy in the vine rows of Bordeaux's Chateau Paloumey.

Working in the vineyards at harvest time is just one of a new range of options that wine tourists, or 'oeneotourists' as they are known locally, can indulge in.

For the first days of the 2007 harvest, a mixed group of nationalities has arrived at Paloumey, in the left bank Medoc region.

BORDEAUX, France, Aug 12, 2007 (AFP) - Selling Bordeaux in a 25cl tetra pack with a straw might seem strange, but so might bringing your own glass to dinner.

That good wine can taste right drunk through a straw is the belief of French wine merchant Cordier, currently selling 1,000 tetra packs a week in Belgium, with plans for a French launch early next year.

The wine, called Tandem, comes in red, white and rose and is aimed at the smaller consumables segment, which grew by 12 percent in France last year.

BORDEAUX, France, July 27, 2007 (AFP) - The embattled Bordeaux 'cru bourgeois' wine category has responded to being banned on labels by the French fraud squad by moving towards redefining itself as a quality brand under annual review.

The idea behind the new 'label cru bourgeois' project is that wines carrying the designation would be tested for quality every year -- a practice unheard of in Bordeaux where the best known 'cru classe' wine categorisation system, drawn up in 1855, has remained almost totally unaltered since its inception despite changes in quality.