In 1860 Abbé Rous, the new Curé at the Chapelle de la Rectorie, first tasted the naturally sweet wine of Banyuls and found it so good that he decided, through his network of Catholic contacts, to make it the communion wine of France.

It’s 1946. War is over. On the sandy tracks of the Racou beach village, amidst fishermen’s huts and makeshift shelters thrown together in darker days by Spanish refugees, people, laugh, drink, share a pastis….