What Took Us So Long?

Location: Alsace, France

Introduction:

France has become a favorite destination of ours but we’d never been to the Alsace region in the northeast before so we made it the focus of this trip. The sense we got from the locals is that they don’t encounter many Americans here. Maybe, it’s because there are so many other popular French regions that attract travelers. Too bad, they’re missing out on a great place! We enjoyed the peace, tranquility and natural beauty of the area so much that we stayed longer than originally planned. We also found lots of fun activities to keep our daughter entertained. She even said she’s ready to move to France.

Sights Visited:

We were fascinated by Montages des Singes in Kintzheim where monkeys roam free in a preserve and the humans have to stay on the paths. It was a unique opportunity to observe monkeys close-up in a beautiful natural setting. To top it off, the park included a play area with extensive rope bridges and numerous obstacles to challenge one’s skills.

The town just north of where we stayed is Ribeauville and Riquewihr was just to the south. Both are popular tourist destinations with lots of quaint shops, cafes and restaurants. Riquewihr retains its medieval architecture within a walled city. It’s classified as one of the most beautiful villages in France. We enjoyed strolling through them both. Each had a local tourist information office, which we took advantage of.

The hike up to see the ruins of Saint-Ulrich Castle in Ribeauville was worth it. The views were majestic and our imaginations ran wild envisioning how splendid this place must have been back in the twelfth century.

We walked to the butterfly garden (Jardins Des Papillon) in Hunawihr. It was nice but modest in size. Allocating an hour is more than enough time for a visit. We travelled about 45 minutes south to Le Parc du Petit Prince, a good old-fashioned amusement park. There was plenty to do with numerous rides, a spacious petting zoo, great kid-powered play areas, a trampoline park, shows and more. This is a great place to take kids.

Cigoland is another amusement park about 20 minutes away in Kintzheim. It’s geared towards younger children. There were lots of birds and animals but no petting zoo. Apparently, it’s a migratory destination for storks and they and their high-perched nests were plentiful. There was a nice playground and splash pad. The rides were good. There’s even a circus tent with daily performances that was entertaining. All in all, it had a chill vibe and we recommend it for children 10 and under.

We read that Europa Park is the best amusement park in Europe. It’s well suited to all age groups. Located in Germany, it was less than an hour’s drive for us. We were indeed impressed and rate it as one of the best amusement parks that we’ve ever visited. It’s themed by country and there were lots of rides, shops, shows, characters, games, food options, play areas and more. Most signage was in German, French and English and we found that many of the staff that we interacted with spoke English. Grimm’s Fairy Tale Village reminded us of Storybook land near Atlantic City, NJ. Our daughter was enthralled.

Accommodations:

We used VRBO to book a five-night stay at a three-bedroom townhouse in a small village named Hunawihr. It was fairly new, quite spacious and beautifully situated adjacent to rolling hills full of vineyards and forest. It included air conditioning in the bedrooms that worked great. There was a washer but no drier; however, there was a drying rack. It lacked WiFi. So, we had to rely on our phone hotspots, which only picked up LTE coverage but, at least, it was something. We used the Wifi at the nearest supermarket for our heavy downloading needs. Everything was working out so well that we extended our stay for two additional nights.

Play:

Ribeauville has an outstanding playground that includes a couple of zip-line gliders. We made play breaks there several times. While exploring the area, we discovered another zip line glider high on a hilltop in our neighborhood with no one else around. The playground in Riquewihr was hardly worth a visit with little to offer.

Food and Drink:

We enjoy French food and the scales will likely confirm that when we return home. However, the entrees in Alsace were predominately meat dishes and we prefer seafood. Vegetables, other than potatoes, were rarely on the menu. We enjoy fresh baked pastries and visited a Boulangerie most days. We ate our fair share but found a lot of the breakfast pastries to be sweeter than what we’re used to. We ate at several restaurants with O’Berge du Parc in Hunawihr the standout. We also took advantage of our kitchen to eat in a few nights and picked up some decent Thai takeout in Germany on our way home after a full day at Europa Park.

Alsace is known for their white wines and we wanted to get to know them better. We were situated on the Alsace Route des Vins where there are countless boutique wineries. Being surrounded by vineyards, it came as no surprise that the village we stayed in had a cooperative: Cave De Hunawihr. Tastings were free and we sampled several of the many varietals they offered and bought a bottle of our favorite, which was a 2019 Silberberg Riesling. We also visited Trimbach and Famille Hugel. The latter still exports their wines through Frederick Wildman and Sons, who Elizabeth used to work for in New York City.

Surprisingly, our place had a drip coffee maker with filters. The local E. Leclerc supermarche had Starbucks coffees but only in whole bean and we didn’t have a grinder. So, the local ground coffee had to do.

Transportation System:

We arranged a car service for an early morning one hour drive to Heathrow airport and flew British Airways to Basel, Switzerland. We thought about using mass transportation throughout our trip but we decided that the flexibility of having a car best suited our needs. It would also allow us to accumulate assorted stuff along the way that would be difficult to transport otherwise such as the giant stuffed animal Adelaide won at Europa Park. So, we arranged a short-term lease for the remainder of our trip through www.motorvana.com This program sets you up with a brand-new car, in our case a Citroën C5-X Hybrid that we picked up right at the airport.

Shout Outs:

We really benefitted from T-Mobile’s basic international service that’s included at no extra cost with our domestic plan. They provide 5GB of high-speed data each, unlimited texts and we can place calls for 25 cents per minute. While the calls are not cheap, we make them infrequently and the data really came in handy when we didn’t have Wi-Fi. The nice thing is that the data allocation refreshes with each country we visit. We can top-up the data if we need more and we get to keep our phone numbers active, which we’d lose if we replaced our Sim cards. That’s why we stuck with our domestic carrier’s offering.

The drinks we purchased at Europa Park came in reusable plastic cups. The cost of the drinks included a 2€ deposit, which was refunded when we returned the cups. What an environment-friendly thing to do. Kudos to Europa Park.

For Your Amusement:

While we were driving to dinner in Colmar, we were taken by surprise when we spotted a replica of the Statue of Liberty. We knew that it had been gifted by France to the United States. We have now learned that the sculptor, Auguste Batholdi, was born in Colmar and this replica was erected in his honor.

So, we’re hanging out one night and Rich is relaxing and trying his luck at Wordle and Elizabeth looks over and asks him if he’s bored to which he says no. But he’s stumped and she offers to help him. Out of character, he swallows his pride and accepts. She asks him if it might be a French word instead of English. Of course it is and wouldn’t you know it’s a five letter French word for boredom.

Highlight:

The natural beauty of the countryside never got old. We’re sure the fine weather we experienced contributed but that seems to be commonplace in Alsace as the annual rainfall is among the lowest in all of France.