Eguisheim marked the end of our journey along the spring-like Wine Route in southern Alsace. Here too, we were once again greeted by the familiar sight of Alsace: winding alleys, window boxes overflowing with flowers, intricately adorned half-timbered houses on facades that glowed in colourful or warm earthy tones – just like in Ribeauvillé, Riquewihr, Colmar or Kaysersberg. And yet, Eguisheim was different. Read more
From my base in Riquewihr, I was able to take short and long bike tours through the vineyards along the Southern Wine Route in Alsace. A rather short tour took me to Kaysersberg, another Alsatian wine village with a long, eventful history and an old town full of well-preserved historic buildings – despite the bitter battles against the German Wehrmacht in the winter of 1944/45. Read more
Before we concluded the final leg of our journey along the Alsace Wine Route in Eguisheim, we drove from Riquewihr to nearby Colmar, which always seems to stand in Strasbourg’s shadow.
In the mornings, when the sunlight glides over the brightly painted facades and reflects in the glassy eyes of the shop windows, Colmar begins to glow. Not a hectic awakening, but a gentle opening of the senses – everything in this city is steeped in colour and history. Colmar’s old town is an architectural picture book, its pages told in half-timbering, sandstone, and cobblestones. Amidst canals, church spires, and winding alleys, a backdrop unfolds that appears both medievally rooted and picturesquely staged. Yet Colmar is no mere historical backdrop; history is the foundation of its present and future. Read more
The second leg of our journey along the Southern Wine Route in Alsace took us from Ribeauvillé to the nearby Riquewihr (Reichenweiher), just a few kilometres away. I had already covered the route the day before on a bike tour through the vineyards and taken a first stroll through the old town to look for photo opportunities. Read more
We drove the last few kilometres through lush green hills full of vineyards, until finally the colourful half-timbered houses of Ribeauvillé announced the destination of our first stage of this journey along the Southern Wine Route in Alsace. My home is the Northern Black Forest, so many decades ago we often visited Northern Alsace for hiking, cycling, or simply to eat Flammkuchen. We had never made it to Southern Alsace, to the area around Colmar, and had thus missed out on places worth seeing like Ribeauvillé, Riquewihr, Colmar, Kaysersberg and Eguisheim – but that was about to change. Read more
On our trip to the south of France, we made a stopover in my Baden homeland for the first leg. After many years, we wanted to experience the sunset from the Hohenbaden castle ruins again. That’s why we stayed directly in Baden-Baden at the castle. The medieval Hohenbaden Castle (“Old Castle”) perches high above the town on the slopes of the Battert and offers a wide panoramic view over the Northern Black Forest, the Rhine Valley, Alsace with the Vosges, and the Southern Palatinate. Read more
In the Wasgau, medieval castle ruins aren’t always found on mountain peaks. Their builders often found strategically located, free-standing rock formations on hillsides or in valleys to be sufficient. The fortresses seem to literally grow out of these rock structures, with the Fleckenstein ruins being an outstanding example. Some of these rock castles, however, are hidden in what is now mature forest. Read more
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