We’re just back from 4 nights in Alsace staying in Strasbourg and Colmar. Michelle was in Strasbourg last December for a business meeting and came home raving about how beautiful it was, how the cathedral was gorgeous, how the people were fantastic, how amazing the sauerkraut was, how good this was, how good that was and so on and so on – so we decided to go with mum in May. May is such a pretty month, the only problem being the TGV to Strasbourg doesn’t start running until June, so instead of the new fantastic speed of 2.5 hours it took us approximately 4.5 hours Paris/Strasbourg which comes under the ‘just becoming too long for rail journey’ headings for me. But it wasn’t too bad. In fact the going part of the trip was relatively quick. We arrived in Strasbourg around 10pm, dumped our belongings at our small but quaint hotel just beside the cathedral and headed off to a restaurant in the historical centre recommended by our taxi driver on his bit out of the way route between the train station and our hotel. Sauerkraut, sausage, pork and bits being the staples we tucked into that first night accompanied by a bottle of Alsatian Gewurztraminer.

Thursday morning in Strasbourg it rained. Thursday afternoon in Strasbourg it rained. Thursday evening it rained in Strasbourg. We didn’t let it bother us really. We took a boat cruise on the river Ill in the morning and rented a walking tour around the historical centre in the afternoon. We stopped for lunch, more hearty fare, coffee and beer off and on all afternoon. Strasbourg is a beautiful city even in the rain. Thursday night we went to a typical Winstub for dinner, with singing and dancing and ate tarte flambee which is like a white sauce pizza till we could eat no more….

The next morning, with the weather looking like it would clear up we rented a car and set off for the first in our day of wine tasting set up again by the wonderful JD. First stop, mad dash down to the house of F.E. Trimbach in Ribeauville at 10am… we were a bit late, we missed the tour of the cellars but made it in time for the tasting where we were offered some great Gewurztraminer, pinot gris, rieslings and vendange tardives and where we of course bought some of the great bottles sampled. Next was lunch in Ribeauville. A very beautiful, but very touristy little town where mum & Michelle chose the restaurant in the centre of the main street of town. Truly, the centre of the street. The cars were coming straight for us as we were quietly perusing our menus, there was a car rally on so we got to see a variety of old cars, most with exhaust problems.

Next stop on the wine trail was one of our favorites from Hunawihr, Domaine Mittnacht Freres. It was the most pleasurable experience so far, we had a price list, we had the attention of one of their knowledgeable staff and we tried a selection of Alsace Cepages and grand crus along with late harvested sweet wines and even a bubbly before walking out of there with a couple of cases of our favorites.

Another pretty voyage through gorgeous little villages and we headed north again back towards Strasbourg where we stopped in Andlau to taste some wines from the domaine Marc Kreydenweiss. Another fan of Quebec his son led us through the Alsace whites and also offered us some reds from their domain in the Cote du Rhone which we really enjoyed. It was a long day. Lots of good wine – we turned around, took the freeway and headed south to Colmar… (to be continued…)