I couldn’t decide whether to post high-rise dwellings for those working-from-home, 1580s style (as tanners, so not popular with the neighbours: it’s a smelly job) … climbing up to the top floor looks a little taxing …
…. or the staircase from the very wonderful Unterdenlinden Museum, once a convent, now an art gallery right up there as One of the Best (a post one day soon?)…..
… or a very earnest, if tiny little figure, spotted on a confessional in St. Martin’s Cathedral …
So much else qualifies too, but three postcards is quite enough, I think.
Technology is still defeating me, so I’ll send you uncommented-on shots from our marvellous day in Strasbourg.
And there you have it. A header showing the cathedral. Details (old) of Strasbourg; details (new) of Strasbourg; the bikes of Strasbourg; streets of Strasbourg.
My computer and I have had enough together now. Before I throw it out of the window, I’ll press ‘publish’.
Technology strikes, so just one photo today of my wonderful day walking the area of the peak known as le Petit Ballon, while Malcolm enjoyed a day’s cycling.
A charming little town just up the road from us. It’s one of the most significant wine villages in Alsace, though not so much on a Monday when almost everything was closed. Fun to explore though.
This little town has many delights. But have a care! It also has La Tour des Fripons. It was one of the two towers protecting the entrance to the town. But it did double duty as a prison. Hence the name. A ‘fripon‘ is a ‘knave‘.
La Tour des Fripons
Our real objective for today was the Memorial Museum at Linge. Here was somewhere that brought to life one of the many horrifying periods of WWI, in this case high in the Vosges mountains. It’s a tale that needs telling, but not tonight. Expect a post sometime after our return home.
We know that over in the UK you are battling with Storm Amy, so I’ll keep quiet about the fact that though it is raining here, it’s the only expected poor-weather-episode in our holiday. So we’ve decided to have an afternoon off, allowing me to send lots of postcards from the Fête de la Transhumance in nearby Muhlbach which we visited this morning, ahead of the deluge we’re currently experiencing.
Transhumance is the practice of taking cattle to spend the summer grazing in the lush upland pasture, before bringing them back down to spend the winter in their home community, Both ends of the season are times of celebration, and here’s transhumance in Seix, from our days in the Pyrenees.
The first people we met after we’d arrived were a group of three people in kilts tuning up their bagpipes. We greeted them in French, then reverted to English, assuming they were Scottish. But no! They come from Strasbourg, speak not a word of English, but are Passionate about Bagpipes, and here they were, ready to play their cornemuses for everyone’s bemusement and delight.
The Alphorn was originally used to call cattle. These days it’s the province of musical folklore enthusiasts and there were several bands of them playing today.
Then it was off to visit the donkeys who would be part of the procession of cattle (Don’t ask. No idea why).
On our way up to view the procession we found the tractor that carried so many of the cowbells the animals wear when in their summer pasture, to keep tabs on them.
Then finally, we could hear all those cowbells clanging away, announcing that the cows were on their way. In truth the cows weren’t happy, and many of them skittered nervously about. I don’t know how much the leading cows enjoyed their fancy headdresses either: but they didn’t complain. By now it’ll be over, and they can forget all about it till next spring, when they’ll be off up the mountain again.
We didn’t stay for the highpoint of the event for many of the locals, the large communal meal, thankfully under canvas. But before we went, we looked round the market: local cheeses, sausage, sweetmeats – cowbells too.
And as we were leaving, something else extraordinary. A procession of people, each holding a large cowbell, which they knocked on each knee alternately as they walked forward, producing a rhythmical cow-bell-dirge. Ouch! Poor knees!
After yesterday’s experience at Colmar, which was Tourist Central, jammed with visitors (like us …) it was good to be at a local celebration: crowded to be sure, but almost exclusively with locals, many of them chatting away in Alsatian, which is widely spoken here, particularly among the older generation.
We feel as if we’ve properly arrived here now.
P.S. WP’s AI suggests the following tags: technology; art; cats.
Today, for Leanne’s Monochrome Madness, Sarah of Travel with Me invites us to photograph ruins. I could so easily take you (yet again) to my favourite ruined abbeys: Fountains Abbey, Jervaulx, or Rievaulx. But Sarah herself has shown Fountains Abbey off in her post. I could take you to ruins all over this country and beyond. Instead, I thought that I’d show you not buildings, but their statues, often ruined by weather, by warfare, or quite simply the passage of time.
Best start in Rievaulx though, where carvings in its museum gave me the idea.
Off to North Eastern France, where the churches and cathedrals of Rheims, Laon and Tournus (to name but a few) have all mightily suffered from the weather eating into into the local limestone from which these were built.
And in Troyes, wooden buildings have taken a weather-beating too.
A church in Bamberg has suffered mightily from having been contructed from limestone.
But even more recent buildings have been ruined a bit. Come to Hartlepool with me.
Let’s finish off by disobeying the challenge completely, at Sant Julia church, in Argentona, Catalonia. Its gargoyles were so ruined they pulled them down. And replaced them. Like this.
By the time you read this we will be at least half way down England, in transit for eastern France – Alsace. So you won’t get prompt responses to any comments I’m afraid, as we shan’t finish travelling till Friday. But I will send a postcard before the weekend is out!
From Pyrenees to Pennines 
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