Vineyard to Vineyard

Hello again! 

Before I go on, I need to explain some background. My best friend and her husband planned a trip to Europe so we arranged to meet them in Paris. Fads (that’s her nickname) and Mark arrived in Paris a few days before us and had lots of fun exploring the city.

We had had some challenging driving in Europe but John driving and me navigating through Paris was a whole new ball game! Anyway, we did make it safely to the apartment and Fads and Mark met us outside. It was very exciting to see them after five months away!

We took a selfie for prosperity. Courtney, Dad thought you’d like the literature they had in the apartment!

We caught up with each other’s news over dinner. I had forgotten how wonderful real French onion soup is!

We then did the touristy thing and headed out to see the Eiffel Tower lights.

The next day we left Paris and began what turned out to be our vineyard tour. We made it safely out of the city (phew!) then drove through beautiful country to the Champagne region. We randomly picked a small village for lunch and found that the season’s picking had begun. Everyone was flat out but we managed to fit in a small champagne tasting. Sadly, John was driving so Fads and I had to drink most of his champagne! The champers was lovely and we ate lunch at a roadside van. I also loved the champagne cork stools they had at the winery!

We then headed to the Alsace region near the German border. The village we stayed in was called Saint-Hippolyte and it was absolutely gorgeous. The old buildings were very German in style and were colourfully painted. 

Our B & B was wonderful. It was in a winery and to get to our rooms we had to walk through the wine making area. The windows of our rooms were decorated with flower boxes.

We had a gorgeous view from our rooms.

In an effort to burn off some of the calories we were consuming, we drove part-way to a nearby castle then walked up the hill the rest of the way. The forest we walked through was beautiful.

We explored the Haut-Koenigsbourg castle which was first recorded in the 12th century. It still amazes us how old everything is here. The castle had been restored a number of times over the centuries.

I loved these cute guys decorating one room.

Cheeky!

And now, just for a bit of tacky fun that is completely out of keeping with the seriousness and age of the castle..... I think John's goatee co-ordinates perfectly with his suit of armour!

We ate at a restaurant that night and experienced the incredibly heavy local food. One of the dishes consisted of potatoes with bacon and slabs of cheese on top. I like my cheese but I discovered there's a limit to how much I can actually eat in one sitting!

The next day we drove and walked around the area. The vineyards looked stunning.

You don't often see three castles as close as these to each other.

We found other villages along the Alsace Wine Route that were just as gorgeous as ours, however they were much more touristy.

Even though they were touristy, these were still working villages. We loved seeing tractors make their way through the tourists as they brought in the freshly picked grapes.

As we walked past a house, someone ahead of us looked up and laughed. We all looked up to find this cat scowling grumpily at everyone that walked past the balcony it was sitting on. What a classic!

We began our last night here with a tasting of about eight wines from the place we were staying at. They were all fantastic!

And we finished the evening with a wonderful meal at a very classy but inexpensive restaurant. Gosh, this is a tough life!

The next day we dragged ourselves away from this beautiful place and headed into Switzerland. We had a laugh at some of the Swiss road signs.

Switzerland is very expensive so it had taken us ages to find a good place to stay. We settled on a hotel overlooking Lake Geneva. We were blown away by the views from our balconies!

We bought food at the local supermarket for lunches cos everything was so expensive. Who needs fancy cafes when there's a comfortable bit of concrete to sit on and yummy salads to eat?

Lake Geneva is surrounded by vineyards. We didn't stay here for this reason, it just happened to be that way. Seriously! We went for a walk through the vineyards and along the lake. It was truly beautiful.

Those of you who have been following this blog since the start of our trip will have seen many photos of John's back as we walk. I thought I'd give you a change of scenery and put in photo's of other backs!

The grapes looked almost ready for picking.

As soon as saw the views from our balconies, we decided to get takeaway pizzas for tea and eat them on the balconies. We were a bit early to order the pizzas so we had some drinks in this fantastic bar while we waited. John and Mark ordered beers - they were massive!

We could also have bought beer with 5% cannabis extract! The drug part had been removed though so it was a weird concept!

We had pizzas, wine and cheese and biscuits on our balconies while we watched the sun set. Can life get more perfect?

Mark seems a by excited by the super-smelly cheese!

We had to check out by 10am the next day but John's mighty football team was playing at about 11.30.  He charmed the hotel receptionist into letting us use a meeting room to watch the game on his computer. Much to our delight, his team won. It's the first finals game they've won in 16 years and they're now down to the last two games. Go Tiges!!!!

Hooroo from the four amigos.