The event on Saturday 21^st October 2000 treated the 18 participants to a privileged view on one of Luxembourg’s 24hour, 7days per week operations.

Even if the structure is perhaps not so imposing as a blast furnace, the continuous production of molten glass is no less impressive in terms of size (and heat) and rate. The float glass provides in principle the raw materials for the other production facility visited at Guardian SA, the Automotive Glass production site, covering tempered and laminated glass for the European automobile assembly lines. Between glass factory visits a visit before lunch was made to the main producer of sparkling wine (Méthode Champagnoise) in Luxembourg, Caves Bernard-Massard.

A tour of their enormous cellars discretely contained at the side of the river Mosel revealed an impressive volume of bottles, vats and tanks, full of some of the best wine and ‘Sparkling Wine’ (only France can call it Champagne), some bottles were turned in all directions, finally on their heads, to have the yeast ‘frozen out’.