France’s most charming town in the Alsace: Colmar

Bonjour Kaptain Kenny readers!

I’m inspired. Do you know why? I read a marvellous Mark Twain quote which inspired me to do something which some of you might say is crazy.

“Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime”

The way I interpret that quote is quite frankly to see as much of the world as possible. Which is why I decided to get a bus from Frankfurt to Colmar for the day.

Looking back, it was much more of an arduous journey than I had hoped for but I’m still really glad I did it!

The trip was supposed to be 4.5 hours each way and I booked with Flixbus which is a German company. As it was a public holiday yesterday, there were major traffic jams both ways. First micro-disaster. Instead of sitting on the bus for 9 hours in total, I ended up sitting on the bus for 12 hours. That indeed makes it much less of an appealing ‘day trip’ I guess but oh well, what can you do.

Secondly, the toilet on the bus had broken down which meant I had to hold it for 7 hours getting there. Note to self, don’t drink so much before a bus trip! Lesson learned.

Thirdly, the bus had run out of water bottles for sale, which I was banking on. I was not only busting for 7 hours but also thirsty. Lesson learned again!

Lastly, the wifi also stopped working but the plus side was that I was finally able to get stuck into a new book I’d bought. I ended up reading 50%. Go me.

Once I got to Colmar, I was soooooo glad to stretch my legs and get stuck into walking the town. I ended up wandering for around 3.5 hours before I had to get the bus home again. All in all, I’d say 3 hours in Colmar is sufficient to see it, take photos and have a bite to eat. If you plan to do some shopping (and surprisingly you can because there are some cute shops there) then you’ll need some more time.

Language wise, I don’t have any French skills whatever. In fact, I’m pretty sure I walked into a juice bar and said: “You don’t speak French” to the owner instead of “I don’t speak French.” Whoops. His wife chimed in and asked if I spoke German. To my delight, I was able to order my food in German. What a weird sensation to be in France and to *only* be able to communicate in German. I guess this is all down to history as the Alsace region in France used to be German and then French again and so on. So most people in Colmar and Strasbourg are probably bilingual.

“Colmar (French: Colmar; Alsatian: Colmer; German between 1871–1918 and 1940–1945: Kolmar) is the third-largest commune of the Alsace region in north-eastern France.

The town is situated on the Alsatian Wine Route and considers itself to be the “capital of Alsatian wine” (capitale des vins d’Alsace). The city is renowned for its well preserved old town, its numerous architectural landmarks and its museums, among which is the Unterlinden Museum with the Isenheim Altarpiece.”

Wikipedia.

For anyone who is interested in romantic, quaint little medieval towns, well Colmar is really your cup of tea. It’s very cute and easy to photograph!

Enjoy the photos below and if you have any questions or comments, please leave a message on this post. I’d love to know what you think.

Click here to follow Kaptain Kenny on Instagram.

/

Click here to like Kaptain Kenny on Facebook.

Au Revoir!