Apr 21, 2023

Villages in Alsace, France

The village of Barr, the wine capital of Alsace, also runs the longest Alsatian wine fair (for more than 100 years). But this festival is not until autumn, when the harvest is completed.

Driving between villages, vineyards are what you get to see, wherever you look.

Vosges Mountains, France

On our way, while looking for a Winstub for our second evening, we visited the nearby village of Andlau where we had stayed previously (autumn 2022). In the center are three restaurants, but none of them was open! One was permanently closed, the other one had a big banner advertising staff hire, and the third one was undergoing a major renovation.

Well, at least, we walked to our favorite picnic spot in Andlau and enjoyed this peaceful view.

Andlau, Alsace

My travel partner likes to visit churches. I come along, but only to light candles for our loved ones.

Looking up, I happened to see this unusual contrail. With a glass of wine in hand, I wondered about its purpose. 🙂

The sky is the daily bread of the eyes. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Apr 20, 2023

Barr, Alsace in Springtime

As we do most spring or fall breaks, we travel to Alsace in France. It is only a short three-hour drive from here (Frankfurt area) and an Alsatian village in the Vosges Mountains provides the perfect get-away.

This time, we chose Barr, a fairly quiet village to the south of Obernai, in the Bas-Rhin department. It gets rather overlooked by the usual tourists. We like it this way.

Only this time around in Barr, we found most Winestub (Alsatian-style pub/restaurant) to be closed. Some looked permanently closed, some were maybe shut down permanently. Others were listed as open, based on the website, but we found them closed as well. Of the dozen or so Winestub or restaurants in Barr, we found only one open on our arrival day:

Restaurant Caveau Folie Marco

We enjoyed a very good dinner ( I had La Munstiflette), and the ambiance and service were excellent.

La Munstiflette at Folie Marco

Friends like to ask what we do on these quiet days in Alsace. Well, we walk a lot, eat well, take afternoon naps, enjoy wine in the evenings, walk some more, and have time to reflect. We like to visit ourselves.

We had rented a half-timbered vacation home close to the village center, and everything was in walking distance – as it should be.

Mar 7, 2019

Dambach-la-Ville in the Alsace

On our way back to Oberursel, we stopped for lunch in the village of Dambach-la-Ville (about 10 minutes from Sélestat). It was Sunday, and very quiet. The only people we saw were a handful of tourists like us heading to the restaurant opposite the church.

This must have be the quietest place on earth. No voices (from neither people, nor animals), no car traffic, no sounds coming from any of the homes. It seemed the residents had all left for the weekend. This was the case on an early Sunday afternoon in late February.

The village (based on all the signs we saw) offers much wine-tasting, hiking routes, and places to stay overnight. Next time, we’re heading to the Alsace, we will spend a few days in Dambach-la-Ville. The village lies on the eastern slopes of the Vosges, and offers quite a few hiking trails.  I’ll even try it – the shortest one is a one-hour trail. I can manage that.

This is one of the many half-timbered homes in the village.

The roads in this medieval wine village were deserted on this Sunday in February.

 

To learn more about this village, visit Dambach-la-Ville, Alsace.

Nov 12, 2016

Ribeauvillé, Les Vosges Mountains, in Autumn

We had a grand view from the vineyards. Don’t forget to bring a picnic basket. And a cork screw.

sunny-view-over-ribeauville

The main road is lined with mostly half-timbered houses.

Sitting in St.Ulrich, Ribeauvillé

Sitting in St.Ulrich, Ribeauvillé

And yes, I still like rainbows.

rainbow-over-ribeauville

With tourism centered around the wine industry, there are some interesting corners to discover around this small town.

wine-barrels

We had rented this one-bedroom apartment via fewo-direkt.de. The first floor apartment is in a quiet side street off the main road. It was perfect for the two nights we spent there.

One thing to look out for is unlocking the door. The lock is a bit tricky, so I would advise practicing unlocking the door in broad daylight. Do not try to open the door in complete darkness, at least not the first time. Unless you don’t mind cursing on the door steps. 🙂

Ribeauvillé Apt

 

Diese Webseite verwendet Cookies. Wenn Sie auf der Seite weitersurfen, stimmen Sie der Cookie-Nutzung zu. Mehr Informationen

Diese Webseite verwendet so genannte Cookies. Sie dienen dazu, unser Angebot nutzerfreundlicher, effektiver und sicherer zu machen. Cookies sind kleine Textdateien, die auf Ihrem Rechner abgelegt werden und die Ihr Browser speichert. Die meisten der von uns verwendeten Cookies sind so genannte "Session-Cookies". Sie werden nach Ende Ihres Besuchs automatisch gelöscht. Cookies richten auf Ihrem Rechner keinen Schaden an und enthalten keine Viren. Weitere Informationen finden Sie auf der Seite “Datenschutzerklärung”.

Close