The "Taylor Tour" of Alsace Begins

Thursday morning, after I spent an evening in a hotel at Frankfurt airport, I met up with the Grants (friends and neighbours) when their flight arrived from Victoria via Toronto.  I was very excited to meet them and have the opportunity to show them around one of my favourite regions, not only in France but also in Europe.  Let "Taylor Tours" begin.

 

We survived the drive down on the autobahn where, unlike its reputation, was very slow because of road construction around Karlsruhe.  While at times we did reach 165 km/h, for a great deal of it, we only went about 45km.  Very frustrating!  One of my favourite German words is "Stau".  It means traffic jam and the sound of the word says it all!

We reached my friends' village, Rhinau, by about 4 pm and, after a rest, we walked to the nearby restaurant called Chez Nino.  It is a pizzeria but also has other items on the menu like veal in a mushroom cream sauce that Eileen and I had and it was served with Spaetzle.  Emmy and Doug had pizza.  After dinner, we walked to the bombed our church in the village (from WWII) then wandered around to the Brunwasser (the stream - okay more than a stream but not a river) and by the garden allotments that villagers tend to.  The evening light was beautiful and it was sweet to see that the village swan had just hatched 4 little cygnets.  I guess while we are here we will see them grow up at least a little bit.