European Adventures 2012: Strasbourg, France

We made our way all the way from the western coast of France (Questembert near Damgan) to the eastern edge of France (Strasbourg) in one day. It went well considering there was one mother, two children, two rolling, rather heavy suitcases, and three backpacks! (It seemed so easy last January back in Minnesota when I said...France is a relatively small, manageable-sized country and the trains are so smooth...actually doing it was another story. That being said, with my two very seasoned travelers at my side...we made it! What a beautiful place to wrap up our European adventure! We chose Strasbourg, because our friend, Fanny, lives here. Fanny was an intern at Normandale two years ago and we were her partner family. We love Fanny and couldn't imagine going to France without visiting her and her native city, which I'd never visited before.

In Strasbourg we visited the cathedral with the famous astronomical clock, we bought lots of books for the Normandale library at FNAC (which I'm now carrying home!), we visited "la Petite France" and we toured the city via boat. That night we got to meet Fanny's parents and had a great dinner at their house.

Here we are at the start of "La Petite France" in Strasbourg. It's the old tanners' section of town and is full of beautiful half-timbered houses. The tops of the houses overhang the bottoms of the houses because the tanners used to hang skins out the windows to be dried after being scraped and cleaned in the river. Jack's favorite part was the boat cruise and the bridge they called "Crow Bridge" because that's where they used to put criminals into wire cages and drown them in the river. The crows would come along to pick at the remains! Ugh!