August 16-18st, 2011, SL Tour Alsace, France ...
On short notice - similar to the Black Forest, weather report was promising - we took the SL for a three-day trip to the Alsace, just about 100 kms away from Weinheim ...
The Alsace is basically opposite to the Black Forest on the other side of the Rhine in France ... first we had to catch a ferry to cross-over ...
Beautiful landscape welcomed us ... the weather was great to drive with the roof down.
First stop was Saverne, a beautiful old little town in the North ... here the main road ...
Close to Saverne we visited the castle "Chateau du Haut Barr", built on a huge rock ...
... here the fantastic views from this castle ... in the far distance the Black Forest ...
... here the SL parked @ the castle ...
... and the "obligatory" photo of us up there ...
For all Aussies we had to take that photo of a real fan: koala, map, kangaroo and the Tassie devil on an ugly duckling (in a pretty good shape) ...
Many of the villages we passed were full of flowers (ville de fleur) ... here one example(Niederhaslach, sounds German: The Alsace has changed "owners" between Germany and France frequently!)
In Molsheim (Bugatti!) we stayed for the first night ... here the town square ...
... we found that 2-star "hotel du centre", which turned out to be a real nice hotel in the middle of the city ... surprisingly with very friendly staff!
A little walk before dinner showed us a different way to air out your shoes ...
... and following the recommendation of the hotel, we had a lovely dinner in a little restaurant there ...
Coming home to the hotel, the next surprise waited for us in the "red-light" district (see photo): the hotel gave us a complimentary glass of wine! ... btw. a lot of wine in the Alsace, mainly white wines.
Next morning we stopped in Obernai ... and found parking directly in the city centre ...
Here a view from the top of the church steps ... as you can see, the same boring photos over and over ;-))
We mainly took very little windy roads - up and down several passes ... here an example taken while driving ...
... we saw these fellows lying beside the road, escaping the fencing ...
We had a stop in a little "friterie" ... an old mill ...
... where we had lunch ... here the owner in his "outdoor kitchen" preparing a burger ...
Here another impression of the beautiful landscape ...
... we shortly entered Colmar (too many tourists!) ... and were slightly surprised to see this statue ... well we drove a lot, but didn't expect to get as far as NY!!!
In Munster (home of the famous cheese), we stayed another night and had dinner in a typical "Alsace" restaurant.
We stayed overnight, because the weather report was fantastic for day 3. Unfortunately it rained the next morning, so we had to shorten the trip a bit. Not to forget a visit at a local "cheesery" ... to buy some of that cheese!
Anyway, it was wonderful to have experienced that ... so close to home!