Grape Juice and Black Forest Cake

We arrived here in Strasbourg from Amsterdam at midnight on the 6th after a long but fairly comfortable 11-hour bus ride from Amsterdam. Thankfully, our good friend David was able to stay awake long enough to come retrieve us from the tiny bus drop-off and take us back to his humble abode to pass out on his pull-out sofa. The next two days were going to be nothing less than intense.

We woke up fairly early on the 7th, jumped in our Ford Fiesta rental and were off to enjoy La Route des Vins along the Vosges of Alsace. Our first stop was Obernai which was so adorable with its timber beam houses and miniature doors...it was cute enough to hug. We fueled up with enough coffee to last us for the long winey day ahead and kept heading south towards Colmar. Next stop was Dambach to have our first taste of Alsatian wine. We tried multiple home-grown grape creations and were blown away by many of the local wines, but the Auxerrois stood out to such an extent that we grabbed a bottle for the trip home. Just when we thought it couldn't get any cuter we drove into Ribeauville (ville with a accent aigu, which my brother still can't pronounce). This town looked straight out of a fairytale and we had to stop and eat some bread and cheese before we moved on again to the normal looking world. One of our last stops was at Riquewihr. Unfortunately, we were greeted by a not-so-friendly old Fench maid who was out of most of the wines we were interested in trying. To make the most speedy of exits, we told her we would buy a bottle of her average yet effervescent French Riesling.

We stopped by a birthday party for a friend of David's in the village of Roppenheim, on our way to Baden-Baden. The birthday boy, Julien, was very welcoming and encouraged us to stay for drinks and an Alsatian speciality: tarte flambée! We watched in anticipation as they prepared it with white sauce, bacon, cheese and onions. Once it was ready we pretty much inhaled the first round and were offered more by the generous guests. We didn't hang around for too long, however, because we wanted to see the spa town Baden-Baden before it got too late. We said goodbye to our new French friends, Julien and Marion. We reached Baden-Baden by 9pm and spent a few hours exploring this Monaco-Karlovy Vary-like town for a few hours. We were initially intimidated by all of the tuxedos and chic boutiques that filled the fancy city centre, but after some icecream and map-consulting, we ended up finding some sweet pocketage (David's term for small areas in town and country that are unique, hidden, and fun). We even drank from one of the hot springs. Come on everlasting life!

On May 8th we left Strasbourg fairly early in order to hike/drive/fondle the Black Forest, which lies between the Alsace region and Munich. We decided to use Freudenstadt as our base, and it was in Freudenstadt where we ate...you guessed it...Black Forest cake. After our cake break, we went for a hike in the Freudenstadt mountains, and then headed to Kniebis for another one-hour hike. All that fresh German air had sparked a hunger for all things cabbage and sausage based, so we stopped in a town on the France-German border called Offenburg for a dinner consisting of dry pilsner, Nuremburg sausage, sauerkraut, and spaetzle. This part of the world is truly unique when considering wine, architecture, geographical features, aaaaaaand modern warfare (!)

 

Bye Bye Amsterdam, Bye Bye Poffertjes

 

Wine Tasting at Ruhlmann Wines in Dambach

 

Black Forest in the Black Forest