Colmar’s Canals and Fairy Tale Buildings

Our day started with a flat bottomed boat trip through what they call the "Petit Venice" part of Colmar. We were lucky to have the boat to ourselves apart from the english speaking guide (especially as it seemed a school group was going through but of course not wanting english commentary). She told us a little of the history about the lovely half timbered houses and made two suggestions for places to go for a good meal. More about that later in this post and another post. The shutters on the windows have different shapes cut out of them. The story we were told is that a house with a single women had a heart cut out to show she is seeking a husband, a newly married coupled couple will cut the heart into a diamond shape to encourage fertility and a more established couple would have three lines cut out to symbolise the holy trinity - neither of us remember why. We were not sure how to take our guide's feedback that our NZ accents were not strong.
That was a great way to start our day in Colmar and we got off the boat and headed for the covered market where we admired the bounty for sale before strolling around this town which is just like the set from a fairy tale movie with so many half timbered houses in beautiful colours. Easter is a big thing here and there were lots of stalls for an Easter market and many decorations. There were also live chickens and bunnies to see. I saw the biggest rabbit I have ever seen! We tried tarte flambe for lunch - a bit like pizza but with no tomato sauce, a creamy base instead - delicious. We also visited the Cathedral where we found a series of crafted dioramas showing the story of Easter week which was pretty cool.
We arrived back very late afternoon a bit footsore and met the owner of our cottage who just happens to be from Otaki and married an Alsatian woman. We had good long chat before excusing ourselves to make ready to go out for dinner. On the recommendation of our boat guide we had decided to treat ourselves to a really nice night out and booked into a really nice restaurant in Colmar for dinner. We were lucky to get in with a booking on the day and were really glad we did. The food was amazing - for the eyes as well as the taste and the service was lovely as well. Starting with a tiny complementary glass of warming celery/coconut milk soup and choux cheese bread accompanied by an aperitif of lovely Cremont (my fav) we moved onto our four course meal.
Standout for me as the open asparagus ravioli with lemon hollandaise. Stephen's favourite was his beef main. We both had the same dish for the fish course so it looks like a photo is missing. What an awesome meal and a lovely stroll back to the car through the town

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bon jour France 🇫🇷

Image
 Well, here we are in France after months of planning and anticipation. After a somewhat bumpy journey due to turbulence we stumbled off the plane early in the morning and nervously got into our rental car to navigate driving on the right hand side of the road while jet lagged.  We had planned a few things to do on the way to our hotel as we couldn’t check in until 3pm.  First on the list was to explore Auvers sur Oise, the small town where Van Gogh died.  The Chateau d’Auverse sur Oise was having an exhibition about him, with some of his original paintings displayed. I was especially pleased that one of the paintings was sunflowers as in my art paper at teachers college we had done crayon pictures of sunflowers inspired by Van Gogh’s paintings. My brain was a bit woolly from jet lag so I don’t remember much detail from the exhibition but it was an enjoyable way to spend an hour or so. Chateau d’Auverse sur Oise After a stroll around the gardens we found a cafe in th...
Read more

The Magnificent Mount St Michel

Image
We were away to an early start to drive to Mont St Michel on our way to the Loire Valley in the hope of beating the crowds. Arriving just on opening time the early start certainly paid off as we did not have to queue to get into the Abbey. What a stunning sight as we drove along the country roads approaching the Mount. I have seen pictures but seeing the reality was quite different. A shuttle bus took us from the parking along a bridge to a point close to the mount and it was a short walk from the drop off point to the entry. The view only got more spectacular as we got closer. I can't imagine how they built such an immense Abbey on top of such a small island and got all the materials required transported there. The narrow street up to the Abbey is not wide enough for a car and is quite steep. It is lined with souvenier shops and eateries designed to woo even more euro away from the tourists but quite pretty. Already feeling breathless we arrived at the foot of steep stairs takin...
Read more

A day in Rouen

Image
The day began with a challenge when, on researching where to park, we discovered that to drive into Rouen we would need a sticker on our car showing we had paid an emissions tax. This can only be purchased in advance and is posted to you and our rental car did not have one attached. After some minor panicking we did a bit of research into park and ride options, then had a brainwave and decided to take a train from the village near our hotel and pick up the car at the days end. Feeling proud of our flexibility we packed up and set off. Imagine our dismay when we missed the train by two minutes and found the next one was two hours later! Rising to the challenge we amended our plans again and drove to the park and ride location. This turned out to be easy and convenient, a lot less stressful than driving into the city and trying to navigate narrow one way systems and to find parking - and was also cheaper than parking in the city. Lesson learned. Rouen is a beautiful city and the place ...
Read more