I’m so very pleased with the headline on this post, but I am probably the only one who gets the joke (unless you’re reading this, Sinéad?) For the rest of you, keep reading to the end for an explanation… 🙂

It’s been exactly two months since we spent 24 hours in the adorable French town of Colmar with one of my oldest friends and her husband, so I figured it’s a perfect opportunity to belatedly share my photos from the trip. Gui and I drove the 3.5 hours from Geneva to Colmar after work/class on Wednesday evening and experienced this magnificent sunset on the road somewhere near Basel:

On Thursday morning, we met up with our friends who were vacationing in nearby Germany, ate a classic French breakfast of cheese, fresh bread and crepes together, and spent the rest of morning wandering around Colmar. It was Ascension Day and the town was packed with tourists by 11am, though I have to say there didn’t seem to be much to do beyond strolling the picturesque streets and relaxing in one of the local cafes. We decided to embrace our full tourist potential by taking a ride on the mini sightseeing train only to discover that we had unknowingly already walked the full length of the town… At least we had the narration to fill us in on Colmar’s history. Several of the buildings around town including the massive church in the third photo below are equipped with little platforms for storks — the birds of the Alsace region — to build their nests. Can you spot the nest’s silhouette on the left?

In the afternoon, we stopped by the mini Statue of Liberty decorating the center of a nearby roundabout before setting off on the short, 15-minute drive out to Alsace wine country. Gui had made a reservation for the four of us at one of the local wineries but we arrived an hour early, so we decided to sit down at a nearby restaurant for some lunch. The waitress informed us that we could only order cold dishes due to the late hour, yet somehow we still couldn’t manage to wrap up our meal within the hour and ended up arriving at the winery quite late. Luckily, our hosts did not seem bothered and we spent a fun hour sampling different wines and touring Schmitt Pierre Paul’s small factory.

After walking off the effects of the tasting, it was sadly time to part ways so we could make it back to Geneva with enough time to return our rental car (which was our best looking ride yet: a mint green Fiat 500). Thank you for meeting us, Sara and Eddie!

And if you’re looking for the answer to my dorky pun of a headline, Colmar is thought to resemble the provincial town that is home to Belle in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. So clever, I know…

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