Travelled to Colmar on the beatifully comfortable and extremely fast TGV train (which was on it's way to Paris and the same train we'll be continuing to Paris with in 3 days time!)
Colmar was beautifully sunny when we arrived so we went to work taking photos straight away! Noticed a cute little green tourist train so jumped aboard and got a 45 minute tour of Colmar for 6 euro!
What a gorgeous place this is!!! Lovely to be in France again - I've only really ever been to Paris and places like Versailles and Eurodisney so was wonderful to finally be in a French village! Having said that, Colmar isn't a small place but it's certainly not a city.
We wandered around, really enjoying the atmosphere and stumbled across an open air farmers market. We looked up the words for 100 and gram (cent gramme!!) and bought some Camembert cheese, a baguette to share and some apples. Mum also bought some terrine -and the whole lot came to about 6.5 euros. Feeling like locals :-) and very pleased with our purchases we found a seat near a fountain to eat our lunch. How perfect!! I went into nearby shop to get some water and found that they had Orangina!!!! Yum!!! More perfect than previous perfect!! :-)
Spent rest of day wandering around and enjoying the sunshine. Had dinner (some Swiss cup a soup! and a baguette) on a rooftop terrace that Mum shared with another room - although we didn't see anyone else on it so it felt like ours!
Thu 13th May
Next day we had a really slow start - and as it was raining outside, and a public holiday, there wasn't much else to do but have coffee, lunch, another coffee etc! I think we were actually both relieved it was raining as we had pretty much seen the sights the day before so it really gave us license to relax! Colmar always ws going to be our 'rest stop' anyway. Occaisionally the sun came out for a few moments and so we'd head around to the Petite Venice (Little Venice) section to take more photos - then head back to our favourite coffee shop to wait out the rain.
Coffee - we haven't had many good ones since leaving Italy!!! We found two coffee shops in Colmar that actually had proper coffee machines (and not the 'press a button and hot milk and coffee will come out' automatic ones - they are all over Switzerland - we only saw a real coffee machine once! Same seemed to apply in Colmar!
Tonight at about 10.30pm there was a bit of a ruckus in the room next to mine. Mum was in a room on the next level down and the noise was so loud she thought it was next to her! It was a couple screaming at each other and throwing things and it sounded like she was being hit by what I could understand - I was sitting in my room, light off, suitcase against the door, trying to figure out what to do. I was too scared to go down to reception as the arguement was spilling into the corridor and there were only 3 rooms and the lift in our wing so I didn't want to get caught getting in the lift. My phone wouldn't work - so I was really relieved to hear the police arrive! It went on and on for at least another half hour. Sobbing in the hallway, lots of men yelling. I don't know if it was better or worse not being able to understand what they were saying. They could have been arguing about the fact that he ate her dessert while she wasn't looking! I don't think so though! I asked about it the next night and the night manager assured me in faultering english that everyone was ok and 'she' was 'normal' again! Okkkkkk.
Friday 14th May
Left to get our freshly baked croissant for breakfast - and walked to find a take away coffee place (a rarity!) we'd seen the day before - they sold proper coffee machines and equipment so we figured they'd make decent coffee. Alas!!!! Oh well - we sat near a park wit fountain and ate our yummy croissant and drank our coffee, despite the taste :-).
Spent the whole day wandering and loving being in France - and with no particular pressure to see sights etc - just enjoy the village atmosphere. We felt like locals when we were recognized and warmly welcomed in our favourite cafe (with fantastic coffee!).
Had yummy vegetable soup at a local brasserie - abd got to say 'tre bon' (very good) :-).
At some point in the day we had a nutella crepe - yummmmmmmmmm
We had dinner (packet soup, Camembert and baguette!) on Mums terrace / balcony again, waiting until dark to go see the lights of Colmar - we're glad we did as it looked beautiful at night! We LOVED being in Colmar!!!
Ha just remembered - in Europe you don't usually have a kettle / tea, coffee in your room. We had a water boiler element thingy that we brought with us - but we'd thought we'd ask fir a kettle to boil water for our soup as it's much quicker. You would thing it would be easy trying to ask for a kettle without knowing the French word for it - we made kettle sounds, pretended to pour water, drink coffee etetc. What we got was two teapots on a tray with hot water in them. This would have been fine had we been ready fir our soup but it was only about 4.30 :-). We had both brought a small thermous with us from home so it all worked out in the end - I really enjoy the challenge of communication - when it's a lighthearted moment of course. Our local boulangerie in Colmar always practises her English 'good byyyuh' with a smile. We really have found that when they see you are making an effort they are very friendly and even help you with pronounciation if you ask for it - and we like it just as much when they shyly try out their English with us!
Saturday 15th May
We were catching a 10.45am train to Paris this morning and went for one last walk around Colmar in the morning. We could see a cute little girl standing near the road (this road was a semi pedestrian mall). As we got closer she stepped in front of us and said something about her Mama. She didn't know where she was!!!! We had about an hour and a half before our train and now a little well dressed girl we had immediately become responsible for!!! She was about 4 years old I think. Anyway - as much as she was cute, I couldn't help the alarm bells ringing - especially when she pointed down a little alleyway as if to say cone with me, I think my mama might be down here! When we started walking with her to begin with I caught a little smirk on her face and thought that she didn't really seem tooooo distressed. Anyway - we were right outside a great coffee place (the only other one we had found!) that we had been to the day before - and explained that we weren't sure what the little girl was saying but tgat she seemed to have lost her mother. Utter relief - they knew her!!!! So took her down the alleyway she was trying to lead us down. We think that she had probably snuck out but couldn't get back in as you had to be buzzed in. Hence the smirk - probably a 'i know I'm naughty but I'm probably ok now' look.
Anywayyyyy - had another great coffee and croissant at that cafe, then caught our train to Paris!!!
Next - Paris and our apartment!!
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Hi girls! Busy keeping up with 3 people's trips now. Had a little video of Hannah on the streets of New York kindly taken by her American friend. She has made purchases in Tiffany's!! She didn't say what!
ReplyDeleteContinuing to enjoy your wonderful blog.
Love Helen.