A day in Strasbourg,France

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Wednesday 23rd September
A day in Strasbourg,France
We enjoyed a bit of a lie in this morning as we plan a trip to Strasbourg,France which is about 40km away and have just a bit of washing to do before we head out for the day.
A fog had come down into the valley overnight but as we arose the sun was doing its best to disperse it and it looks as though it will be another beautifully sunny day.
As part of the supermarket shopping yesterday we bought a packet of speck(German bacon)to have with poached eggs.The speck looked like it had been sliced but upon opening the vacumn pack we discovered that it was still all in one piece a bit like a steak.The knives in the drawer all looked brand new and sharp so I attempted to slice the speck to make rashers with a moderate amount of success.Gretchen was concerned that she would be racing me down to the doctor if I sliced a piece of my anatomy off while doing the deed through inattention.
It was a hearty breakfast even though the speck was very salty.It is probably best eaten mixed in with something else to ease the salty taste.
With the washing done and hung on the small expandable line on the sunny terrace we headed off on route #28 towards Strasbourg.The road wound its way along the valley floor until we could see the horizon opening up before us as the valley came to an end at Oberkirch and we started to drive on a flat plain.
Here there were orchards everywhere and the harvest of apples and pears looked to be going on in earnest.The trees in the orchards are not the size we have in NZ rather they appear to be grown on a trellis or vine type system and were no higher than about 6 or 7 feet making the harvest easy without the need for any special climbing equipment.The trees were absolutely laden so it looked a pretty successful way of growing the fruit.
We stopped in at a wayside stall and purchased a couple of bags of Gala apples(yes,ordinary Gala like we used to grow in NZ and not the fancy cross breeds we have now)and pears both of which will last us a couple of weeks!!We are surely not missing out on fresh fruit and have eaten so many nectarines since we arrived in Europe.
The River Rhine is the border between Germany and France although as it makes its way across the flat plain it is not all that special to photograph.Here too the old border crossing buildings have gone with just a chicane left to drive through to tell you that you are leaving Germany and into France,at least until you notice all the road signs are in French!!
We were aware that Strasbourg ahs an old part of the city worth exploring but finding a car park proved a challenge as we followed blue P signs after P signs only to find they didn’t lead to a parking building.Finally as we were about to give up and go back to a park and ride on the outskirts of the city we found an entry to an underground car park.And as it turned out it was free!!Well that is what we understood and we hoped that RR would still be there when we got back from our sightseeing.
We plan just to look at the old city and so headed off down a wide boulevard with the spire of the cathedral which we thought would be located in the centre of the old town in our sights.
The old city is encircled by what seems to be a canal although there must have been some rise and fall in it because it was flowing quite fast and therefore we assume it had some inlet from a river and an outlet somewhere,not that we ever came across it in our walk.
Everyone(well it seems like it)has a baguette for lunch and most eat it while walking between wherever they are going.As it was lunchtime we thought we better join the crowd as well and found ourselves a bakery and came away with a baguette to share.We had thought we would sit down by the canal where we had noticed other people but we couldn’t find a way down to it from the footpath in the area we were in.So we sat on a wall outside some apartments and watched the world go by.
The city must rank as one of the quietest we have been in on this adventure and although there was traffic the trees and buildings seemed to absorb the noise better than we have experienced in other places.Even the new looking light rail glided by almost silently.

design it dominates the skyline and the centre plaza surrounding by very old 3 story buildings with cafes and mainly tourist type shops on the ground level and living accommodations on the upper levels.The plaza cafes were doing a roaring trade and even though it was now pushing on towards 2pm they were still busy.We have noticed that Europeans take a long time off for lunch!!!
The interior of the cathedral was dark but this set off the beautiful stained glass windows which date from 1284 just perfectly.We would have to say that the windows would be the finest we have seen in any of the cathedrals and churches we have visited.The huge organ seeming suspended on a column half way down the nave was an awesome sight and it would have been great to hear it played.Like most of the structures of this type we have visited the place was undergoing a little bit of reconstruction but not so much as to distract from our walk around it.The cathedral also has an astronomical clock with characters that looked like they rotated on the hour which unfortunately we missed by a couple of minutes doing its thing.
We strolled around the rest of the old city area taking in the very old buildings and narrow alleyways before heading back to RR along a road above the canal where tourists were lining up for a ride on a boat.
RR was still in the spot we left it and no ticket was stuck under the wiper blades.Getting back to the main road to Germany proved to be a bit more of a challenge than we expected as the road we wanted didn’t have a left hand turn and by the time we found a road that did we were taking a tiki tour of a inner suburb.
At the last town before we entered the long valley where Bad Peterstal was located we found a good sized supermarket and did our shopping for dinners for tonight and tomorrow.The store had a very tasty looking display of salmon so that has ended up on the menu for tonight along with a selection of German beers and an Italian bottle of wine(well this is the BBA and it was at a good price) .

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