From Cider to Champagne: Adventures in France 2025

Well, the whole idea for this holiday started with my desire to visit (and taste) Champagne so, as our holiday was nearly at an end, we packed our bags once again and headed off to fulfill this wish. Our drive took us over the Vosges mountains. We wended our way up windy roads through the woods and over the mountains, spying villages and farms nestled between the trees and in the valleys. The scenery changed as we got near to Champagne and there were more open fields. Throughout France we have seen rapeseed growing, with its beautiful yellow flowers brightening the countryside. However, once we got over the mountain range the amount of rapeseed crops seemed to increase. One thing that surprised me given the copious amounts of cheese and other dairy products on offer, is the few dairy or other animals we have seen. We have seen the odd group of maybe 8-10 cows outside but not the numbers you would expect. I know they do house them in barns but thought that was only in very cold months. ...

We began our day in a tiny village called Turckheim where we attended mass to celebrate Easter. There is something that feels extra spiritual about hearing mass in a very old and beautiful church with a fabulous choir singing and someone playing the organ with skill. And Easter is a lovely time of celebration and rejoicing in the church. Turckheim is another cute village but less well known. There were some easter markets just by the church and some decorations livening up the village. It also had the characteristic coloured houses of the region Miles, our host of the cottage we are staying in, had suggested we visit Eguisheim, another traditional village which he said was less touristy than the one we visited the day before so we headed there. It certainly was less crowded with tourists, although the damp weather may have helped with that too. Before we got to the old original part of the village we spotted this modern sculpture which took our fancy. We found out it commemorates t...

One of the reasons we came to Alsace was to try some Alsatian wines so when we spotted a wine cave that was open on our way to Castle Haut Koneisburg we stopped off for a tasting. It was still earlyish in the day and we were the only ones there and the winemaker seemed happy to give us any number of his wines to try and was quite generous in his pours. Being mindful of the need to drive up a very windy road to the castle we kept ourselves in check but enjoyed tasting some different wines. We wound up the zigzagging road to the top of the mountain on which Haut Koneisbug is perched. A perfect site for a defensive castle with 360 degree views. Parking was tricky but we squashed in and climbed to the castle entry. The castle had been restored from disrepair by Kaiser Wilhelm II from 1901-1908. While the scientific research of the time was pretty particular, some aspects of the restoration are guesswork as no documents were located to inform the work and a few aspects were changed to fit...