Avis' 2nd Genealogy tour Baden- Alsace
5 - Mulhouse & Colmar

Day Three continued - Bonndorf (DE) to Mulhouse

We soon turned off through the Harthe Sud forest to Rixheim & back to Mulhouse the way we used to before, to the Hotel du Musée. Our bathroom is a bit run down but the hotel has location, location, location. Avis thought the landlord was surprised to see us again. We went out for a wander to the main square via the University area & found weddings in progress. The first was a noisily greeted presumably Algerian affair, with a coach & horses for the happy couple. The second was a more sober French affair, both in the Town Hall. While the cathedral looks a bit like Köln's, it is a Victorian fake & described as the "Temple" of St Stephen, being protestant & one imagines, severely Calvinist. While stopping for tea (quite competently made but E5 for two), we saw the extra time of the English Cup Final between Manchester United & Arsoles. Nil-nil at the end. We went back to the hotel for Avis to grumble about the facilities & me to do our laundry.

This house is from Mulhouse's Swiss period 1515-1798, as it has cantonal shields on it.

Mulhouse's Temple of St. Stephen

Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin) University

Day Four - A trip to Colmar

It rained again overnight & our washing was hardly drier. Breakfast was adequate, not as limited as Avis seemed to remember but she was a bit pissed off with the landlord, as she heard him discussing us & chuckling with another guest last night, although she did not hear the detail. I said he was probably bewildered by our mission. There was a slight disaster at breakfast, as an Austrian coach party arrived late last night & clogged all the tables. We had to wait ten minutes before we got one! After, we drove up to Colmar, parking without difficulty North of the Old Town & free of charge. Otherwise, we have been paying between 0.50Sfr to 1.50E, admittedly, the last at Baden-Baden for a long time. We went to the Unterlinden Museum (admission E7 each but included an excellent audio guide). Nick Serota had mentioned the Grünewald Triptych to Avis but I knew it was here. We spent a long time in the museum, as there were many good examples of medieval & renaissance art, apart from the triptych. Then, we wandered round the gorgeous Old Town, which has many old buildings like Riquewihr etc. We had lunch (salmon Avis, choucroutte for me) on the Quai des Poisonniers at Le Petit Gourmand, slow service but good food, E34 with tip.

		The Pfister House
Unterlinden Museum	Quai des Poissonières	Little Venice

We left at about 3 & I drove up into the Vosges. There were two bits of impossible map reading but we eventually went over from Munster to the valley with Thann in it (D10-D27), filling up with petrol at last in Fellering before the N66 to Mulhouse for E44.67. This trip took us quite high, almost to the top of the Grand Ballon but the petrol shortage prevented us going that way. In Mulhouse, we went out to a café in the main square, now almost deserted (at about 1930), where we wrote postcards & had allegedly big coffees at the Vieux Mulhouse, E5.60, the cream being 0.60 extra! Then back for laundry, putting clothes on the lamps to dry them off somewhat faster.

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