Day 46: Colmar > Eguisheim > Colmar

It was another lazy day today. Not that we sat around and did nothing, but we didn’t set any records either.

Today was almost a mirror image of yesterday.

Yesterday we started the day with 3°C, and it got up to a balmy 20° or so by lunch. Yesterday I didn’t take my warm jacket, and regretted it for the morning.

Today we started the day with 15°C, and it gradually got colder all day. And wetter. Today I did take my jacket and didn’t really need it, but as the day wore on, I was glad I had it.

We made another strategic blunder today. Another day, another blunder 😞

But I’ll tell you about that later.

Breakfast, coffee, and we were out the door early … around 8.30am.

Yes, I know … if “early starts” was an Olympic sport, we’d be nowhere near the podium. But when you consider that nothing much opens here until 10.00am, an 8.30am start is pretty impressive.

We wanted to go to Eguisheim today. If you ask ChatGPT – as I did – what are the top 10 scenic villages to visit in France, Eguisheim is close to the top.

Yesterday’s exploration of the local area was kind of north and west, so today’s exploration of Eguisheim was more south and west.

But keep in mind that I have no sense of direction. I am pretty sure that Germany is east of here.

So we were out the door, into Claude, and heading off in the right direction thanks to Josephine’s instructions, by 8.30.

Eguisheim is a circular township about 15 minutes drive away. Honestly, it was so close that we didn’t have the opportunity to take a wrong turn before we got there.

We got into Eguisheim early, begore the crowds, and had no problems parking. Then we wandered around Eguisheim for a while in the pre-tourist quietness.

Another pretty little village, straight out of a Hallmark movie.

The cobblestone streets are quite difficult to walk on because they are very uneven. As we were walking into Eguisheim, I Iost my footing and tripped over on a particularly uneven spot, and took a tumble. No damage done, but it pays to be careful.

MBW has been complaining of a sore knee, probably for the same reasons.

As I said, the morning started to get cooler, and the dark clouds were rolling in. We found a little boulangerie and had almond croissants and nice, hot coffee.

By 11.00am we were done in Eguisheim, so we went back and found Claude, and asked Joséphine for directions back home. We had planned to do another walk around Colmar and grab a bite to eat for lunch.

One of the things that we have heard about that is a “thing” here in Colmar – the local speciality, if you will – is a tarte flambee. It’s like a pizza, except they use a flatbread instead of normal dough for the base. They also don’t use a tomato based sauce, but instead use creme fraiche.

Other than that, it is similar to pizza. A traditional tarte flambee will have bacon (or ham), onion, and cheese and it is cooked in an extremely hot oven.

There were a couple of places that we’d heard about, so we went to the first one and it had a sign saying that they had no tables free.

We went to the second one – which is supposed to be run by an elderly couple – and managed to snag a table as someone else was leaving. We were handed a menu, given a minute to decide, then when we pointed to the tarte flambees on the menu, the old guy serving used his finger to cross out all of the hot food. He shook his head and said in perfect English, “no cook.”

Which I think means “choose a cake, because we are not serving hot food today.”

So we left again.

Found another place around the corner and ordered a traditional tarte flambee, and a Munster tarte flambee .. “Munster” because it also has Munster cheese on it which is a bit more bitey.

And they were good. Like a light pizza, but enough to fill a space and keep us warm on a cold, rainy afternoon.

From there we did a bit of a wander around, fighting the crowds, and buying some last-minute souvenirs.

We also bought a cake from Gilg, a Pâtisserie that we were told not to walk past.

Home for a cup of tea and our cake. By now it was about 2.00pm and we needed to source something for dinner.

Yesterday afternoon we did a trip to E.Lecerc to buy some stuff, but decided to wait to get some last minute food and stuff today, for dinner tonight and the onward journey to Strasbourg tomorrow.

So we went out to get something for dinner. Something that we can cook easily in an under-equipped kitchen with a hotplate, portable oven, and not much else.

Easter doesn’t seem to be celebrated in any meaningful way here, and they barely even stop trading. Although we been warned that Easter Monday is the day that they all have off, so it was very important that we did some shopping today so we don’t go hungry.

Very. Important.

We were wrong. Despite our research indicating that shops would be open today, they were closed. No E.Leclerc, no Grande Fresh, no Monoprix.

All closed.

Which presents a problem.

We decided to just go for a bit of a drive to some randomly selected village towards the east … towards Germany, but not into Germany … hoping of improving our chances of finding something open.

But that was a bust. A pretty little village to be sure, but nothing was happening. Nothing open, nobody out and about.

Dead quiet.

I would have been happy to pop down to the local fish and chippery and getting $5.00 worth of hot, salty chips for dinner … but we haven’t seen one the whole time we’ve been here.

I’d even be willing to pick up some KFC, but … same, same. You don’t see them.

We found a tiny little corner shop that sold absolutely nothing with any nutritional value, but they did have some baguettes that appeared to be fresh. There were other couples in the store furtively looking around and making purchases, and we can only guess that they had also made the same strategic blunder that we did, and wanted to buy the last carton of eggs before someone else got them.

With our lucky bagette in hand, we went back into the city to get a photo of the Colmar sign, and then home.

I’ve offered to get dinner ready tonight because it will be an easy one. Baguette with butter and strawberry jam.

But don’t feel sorry for me. A fresh baguette with French butter and strawberry jam is like a party on my tastebuds.

And coffee, of course.

After dinner we might go for one last walk down into the old city of Colmar and look at the lights. Hopefully all of the tourists will have gone home by then.

But with sunset at 8.28pm, we will need to wait a while for maximum effect.

Tomorrow we head for Strasbourg. We already know that the shops will all be closed, and it’s only about an hours drive from Colmar, so we will be going the long way. Otherwise we will arrive long before we are allowed to check in.

But I have no idea what we will be eating tomorrow.

Does anyone know how to say “can I have a bucket of the Colonel’s hot and spicy chicken, please” in German?

Ciao

#Europe2025