Hiking in the vineyards

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We came to Alsace yesterday after a few days in Paris. Our stay there coincided with the full flowering of a cold I caught in Norway, so I was rather inactive, although I did manage to see Monet's huge, magnificent paintings of the lily ponds in his gardens at Giverny, which are hung in specially-designed rooms at the Orangerie. The building was being renovated for decades and, of the many times I've visited Paris, this is the first chance I had to see them. They probably helped me banish the cold!

Today we started our hike into the Vosges. It was a comparatively easy day: about 11 km, through vineyards and then up one side of a forested hill and down the other. Tomorrow the real fun starts: the guide book says we'll be ascending 1250 m altogether!

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