Continuing with our non-stop travel trend... I had found a killer hotel deal in Strasbourg, France. Strasbourg isn't that far away - only about two and a half hours - and many people do it as a day trip. We haven't been yet. There's no reason as to why, we just haven't gotten around to it. After three years it seems kind of silly to still skip over a "standard" day trip. As I was saying, I found a killer hotel deal, so I planned out a weekend for us. The plan was to spend the night Friday in Strasbourg, spend Saturday seeing Strasbourg, then on Sunday drive the Route de Vins to Colmar before going home. This got the most of our time and justified getting a hotel. I wasn't sold on doing a full weekend trip so soon after our cruise (I still haven't full unpacked), but I didn't want the deal or time to pass us by. Off we went.
After work and packing the car, we got a bit of a late start on Friday night. We didn't get checked in to our hotel until close to 10. Our hotel was... interesting. Quite basic. I had to remind myself you can't expect much when you paid the price we did. It was safe and mostly clean, so I guess I can't really complain.
Saturday morning we looked outside to find the sun shining. Sun during the winter in our part of Germany is a bit rare. For the better part of a week we had rain. It was such a treat to see the sun! We gathered ourselves together and took off for the day. I had no plans for Strasbourg. There were no museums I wanted to see, nothing I had to do. I was content to wander around and take it in. Strasbourg is in the Alsace region of France, and this area has passed back and forth in ownership between France and Germany many times. It is known for its wine and having "cute" half-timbered houses. Be prepared to over dose on cuteness.
Our first stop was the Strasbourg Cathedral - it stands so tall it was easy to orient ourselves in that direction. I love when I get the chance to go inside a church when the sun is shining- it makes the stained glass a whole new experience.
After our walk through the Cathedral we went through a walk through the rest of the town. My favorite area was "Petite Venice," which is an area where (back in the day) there used to be tanneries, bakeries, ect. Lots of small houses along canal ways. (I just have to add here, I find it quite funny that everywhere seems to mention or compare things to Venice. Each country has their own "Venice-like" spot. In Germany, Dresden is "the Venice of the North," while Amsterdam also claims the same title. In Belgium it is Brugge. In France, it is Strasbourg. In Colmar, France, there is another area referred to as "Venice." Really? Get a little more creative on your names. While Venice is unique and beautiful, I didn't think it was THAT great). Anywho. Enjoy half-timbered house cuteness.
By the late afternoon the sun had disappeared, and we had seen all we wanted. I was satisfied with my Strasbourg experience. We walked back to the hotel to get our car. We picked a grocery store out of the GPS and went out to buy some wine and restock our wine rack. I had picked a Cora grocery store, which is a French chain of grocery stores. Imagine my surprise when what we drove up to was the size of a Costco and looked like a giant super Walmart on the inside. Since it was a Saturday afternoon there were wall to wall people, but I still managed to get some good, cheap wine.
The next morning we were greeted by the sun once again. After checking out of the hotel and loading up the car, we went on our way on the Route de Vins. The Route de Vins is a small highway which runs along many small towns between Strasbourg and Colmar (although the route goes a bit past Colmar, we were stopping there). The towns are all suppose to be "cute" and surrounded by vineyards. I wanted to drive down the route and select one or two places to stop along the way. T
The first place I chose to stop was Haut Koenigsbourg Chateaux, as it was one of the closest stops to Strasbourg. I didn't really have any desire to go inside the castle, I just wanted to "see" it. I'm glad I picked this as a destination. I could see many small castles dotting the hills and vineyards as we drove along. When we turned off to drive towards Haut Koenigsbourg, we started winding our way up the side of a mountain. This gave us a panoramic view of the area
This picture/view made Josh and I both think of home.
After our viewing stop, we hopped back in the car. The next destination I picked was Riquewhir, as Rick Steves dubbed it one of the best villages to stop at. Although, I have to say, as we drove past all the other little villages on the route, they all looked nice and probably deserved a stop. But I can see why Riquewhir is the most popular. The village itself is tiny, yet it is full of narrow, winding cobble stone streets, and brightly painted half-timbered houses. It reminded me of a better, smaller French Rothenberg. I absolutely loved this little gem, I think it will make a great day trip destination for our future guests.
I was surprised to find that on a Sunday afternoon most of the shops were open. I was also surprised to see so many other tourists (mostly German) wandering around. We looked through a few different stores before going back to the car. By this time it was noon, so I thought I would pick Colmar, our stopping point on the Route de Vin. Although we drove the route and drove past many of the villages, I would happily go back to this area to take a second look or see other villages.
We arrived in Colmar, parked the car, and set off wandering. Rick Steves recommends using Colmar as your headquarters, not Strasbourg. As I said, I only picked Strasbourg because of the hotel price. Colmar is suppose to be like Strasbourg only smaller, quainter. It was a quiet Sunday - most shops were closed, and there weren't too many people out. Without crowds or the distraction of stores, we walked through Colmar pretty quickly. Or maybe, by this point, we had both over dosed on cute half-timbered houses and were ready to be done. That could be the case too. It's not that I didn't like Colmar, I did like it... I think we were just ready to be done and head home, so it made it easy to "see" the town in a short amount of time.
This ended our Route de Vin trip and we headed home. We were blessed with good weather and sunshine, which only added to a fun weekend. I don't know why we waited so long to go here... but it was well worth the wait.
