It’s gotten nice-n-real, other than a few technical glitches, including a little misunderstanding concerning WiFi, and another one concerning whether Visa ought to let me add more data to my locally-acquired cell phone. (The better to real you with, my dear.)
In the interest of speed-blogging from my very temporary office here at McDonald’s (I know), and given that Google Photos isn’t letting my PC see all the photos my phone can see, quick tour of the first couple days of sites.
1. Haut Koenigsbourg. Kaiser Wilhelm decided to restore a castle as an expression of his imperial ambitions. Mostly that didn’t work out (the empire), but the castle tour is pretty good. It turns out I have a minor obsession with building techniques. Lots of photos of castle walls.
2. The Unterlinden Museum. I never really did get much past the medieval art — but you knew that about me. The number of different versions of the Blessed Mother and Angel Gabriel getting real with each other is pretty amusing. Just exactly how did she take that news? Artists’ opinions vary.
In addition to the collection, the Unterlinden wins points for letting you out for lunch and not charging you to get back in later in the day. We wandered around Colmar and found lunch at the restaurant on the right (photo below), overlooking the canal, though it was cool enough outside that children asked to eat indoors. Where the stone walls were pretty nifty, so that worked for me.
So the above shows you Colmar being picturesque, but after having accidentally toured the entire Alsatian countryside in the search of our rental house, honestly the kids weren’t as excited about Urban Picturesque, because every.single.village is overwhelmingly charming. L. had been in-country less than twelve hours when she made the decision to move here. Because yes, it really is the best place in the world, thanks, as any local will tell you.
Also, the ice cream for the kids’ menu came in these little plastic cows:
Nearly covered over the sin of one of my children ordering chicken nuggets.
Since then – Obernai, castles, castles, castles, the Ecomusee, a Trappist guitar Mass, and also castles.