Sunday June 14th - welcome to Medieval Times!

Sunday, Mark and I headed to Weil-am-Rhine - just across the border in Germany. They had a weekend-long Medieval festival that we wanted to check out. Now we'd never been to a medieval festival before, so what better place to check one out than Germany! We missed the first day, as we were hanging out at the castle in France, but managed to make it to the park around lunch-time on Sunday.

Here are a couple of the more elaborate costumes on display/for sale:

There was live music - sometimes on the stage, and sometimes just randomly in the park. They were actually really good:

Sunday was family day, and here's a shot of a guy demonstrating blacksmithing techniques to the kids - in between turning around to smoke his cigarette:

Must have the occassional damsel in the stockade. And apparently, she must beg you for your ice cream/water/beer as you walk by...:

The day was hot and sunny - not exactly typical here, and it was gorgeous. We had some meat on a stick, grilled sausage, kraut with bacon and some German noodles, and Mark had a cherry flavored beer. And of course we had ice cream. It was a good day of just hanging out in the sun and people watching. And lots of walking. We finally made it home for dinner, watched a movie, and crashed after the crazy weekend!

Exploring Alsace

Saturday, June 13, 2009 - Off to a French castle!

I met up with Mark and a group from Jet for a tour of a French castle on Saturday. We had two wonderful French guides, Sophie and Joseph, also from Jet - they shuttled us to lunch, the castle and then on to a wine cave. We are very thankful for their hospitality, as we could never have gotten all of this done as a group! After stopping for a wonderful lunch at a French restaurant, we headed further north to Colmar - home of Haut-Koenigsbourg, the only restored castle in the region, if I remember correctly... We had a great guided tour (in English...) that made the visit so much better than just roaming around would've been. Tons of pictures follow:
The short but steep hike up to the castle:


The view of the valley below was magnificent - as are most views we've had so far:

Our first glimpse of the castle:


This is one of our French friends/tour guides/chauffeurs, Sophie (on the left):

Another breath-taking view - this one from inside the castle:

A ceramic "oven" - very inspiring for the ceramist in me!

Weapons, anyone?

Some furniture from the 1500's - not original to the castle, but cool none-the-less:

French dorks:

And what trip would be complete without a picture of a door?

This really was a great day. After the castle, Sophie and Joseph hauled us all back to a border town of Switzerland for a wine tasting! See part two of today's blog for the wine story!