Strasbourg, Saturday October 4

We started the day with a short drive through the countryside to the nearby town of Sélestat, located on a busy railroad line heading from Strasbourg down through Colmar to Basel. After getting burned with €75 tickets from Paris to Strasbourg, it was a welcome surprise to find out that a round trip ticket from Sélestat to Strasbourg cost only €22.50 for the two of us. It was a special weekend and holiday rate, and that one ticket would have been good for a group of 5 people! It was a fast, nonstop trip in to the big city.

Our major plan for the day was to meet up with Bruce’s high school classmate Carolyn MacRae for lunch and an afternoon of touristing. She was in Europe visiting her son and his family in Germany and had coincidentally arranged a side trip to Alsace for a photo expedition in the nearby Vosges mountains at just the time we planned to be here. You can see some of her nice work at her website, and we expect that there will be some Alsace images there after she gets back home.

Not knowing the train schedules, we intentionally got to Strasbourg early and used the time for a second very tasty breakfast and a bit of wandering in the center of town.

First impressions, walking toward town from the railroad station. The older part of town is located on the Grande Île in the Ill River (both pronounced ‘eel’), and the railroad station is just across on the other side.

Here’s the layout of the whole place.

Breakfast, Part II

 Lots of shops along the way. These guys spoke to us.

One of many, many examples of Franglais, clever plays on words, and other violations of the French language that we have encountered so far. They even made word play out of their name for dog poop mitts, toutounets (toutou means doggie, net is clean, and tutu is baby talk for derrière).  Is there still an Académie Française, or have its members all died off?

One of many architectural gems at the square in front of the cathedral. We will be back there later in the day, but now it’s time to find Carolyn’s hotel and get on with the agenda.

Wow, Carolyn’s hotel was deeply camouflaged. We’d hate to be trying to find it after dark while lugging suitcases. Her room was amazingly tiny. We reunited quickly and then set out to decide which of the many lunch offerings we wished to partake of.

 

 The Academy of Beer had an intriguing name, but we settled on a place with a large outdoor area, lovely views, and a marvelous menu. It was called La Corde de Linge, or the Clothes Line, after a laundry that was located next to the river. All the food choices were named for types of fabrics, like wool, cotton, or poplin (laine, coton, popeline).

Carolyn and her monster size blue cheese burger, Sue Anne and her trout in horseradish crust, and Bruce’s chicken with mushroom sauce and spaetzles. Carolyn’s burger was called Blue Jeans on the menu.

And a triple fruit flavored ice cream treat, appropriately garnished and served with colored marshmallows. You never know what you’re going to get.

Then we purchased tickets for a riverboat cruise around the island, due to depart in about two hours. The boat rides are clearly very popular, and they were really booked up. It was a weekend, the weather was beautiful, and more than the usual number of tourists were expected in town due to a holiday in Germany, the Day of Unification (Tag der Deutschen Einheit). We were in Berlin a day or two after the holiday last year, and the party was still going strong.

So, there’s two hours till the boat leaves, but there’s plenty to see in town.

 

 A view looking up toward the cathedral, Notre Dame, completed in 1439. Sue Anne has no idea what the yellow building is that is partially blocking the cathedral, but she liked the roof.

A Segway tour passing the cathedral

Segway, a proud product of New Hampshire!

 
And then onto the boat for a tour around the island. Narration was available via headphones in something like 16 languages. We would run out of bits if we were to have taken a picture of all the beautiful buildings and interesting scenes along the way, so here are just a few of them.

This is said to be the most photographed scene in all of Strasbourg, so we did our part to keep up its reputation. Our lunchtime restaurant can be seen on the right side of the picture.

 We passed through two locks on the way around the island.

One thing we failed to do is to take any pictures of the boat itself. But there are plenty of them available online. Here’s a link.

And the name of the boat service, Batorama, is another great example of the contemporary ruination of the French language. (Bateau = boat) Love it! 

Then a walk back to Carolyn’s hotel, goodbye till next time (likely high school reunion next summer), and walk back to the nearby railroad station. Along the way we passed this outdoor restaurant that had been pointed out in the narration on the boat ride. Once upon a time musicians would sit up in the branches of this very ancient tree and serenade the patrons.

A local train back to Sélestat via a dog leg route took us a bit longer to get back than it had taken to get to Strasbourg in the morning. We were amused on the way by three young children engaging their mother in a spirited game of rock, paper, scissors. Then came a bit of bother till we figured out how to turn on the car’s headlights for the first time, but all ended well.

Then a good night’s sleep after our long day out.