Spring in the village.

[sister_luck]

Now that the frosts have returned, I can scarcely believe how lucky we were with the weather for our roadtrip. It might have helped that our destination is known as one of the sunniest areas in Germany. Naturally, everything was just a little bit greener than at home.

The village where our friend lives is quaint and picturesque, with signs of authentic village life and while most of it was spick and span it didn't have the well-scrubbed artificial look of the more touristy places. Because we only stayed for such a short while I didn't get the chance to walk around and take some proper pictures, so all you get are views from the two balconies.



S. shares a flat in a house that is owned by what I assume is one of the older families from the village. The landlords' son-in-law runs a restaurant around the corner where we had our evening meal - simple and home-made food which is something I appreciate. The communal staircase though was really rather creepy - apparently the son-in-law loves hunting and has been on several hunting trips to Africa and has the trophies to show for it. I'm glad that at least there wasn't any taxidermy involved, but the collection of various antlers, horns and warthog tusks was bad enough. I'm not totally against hunting - I can see the point if you end up eating what you kill. Trophies though are frivolous souvenirs and I hate to think how the actual hunting in Africa was conducted.

Here's a much more peaceful scenery, with fields in early spring and the mountains in the background. The famous Kaiserstuhl may well be among them:



The balcony on the other side of the house gives you an impression of rural life that seems to have not changed much at all:

Comments

[so-sharlemaine.livejournal.com]

Very peaceful looking :)

I agree about the trophy hunting. It breaks my heart that people can do that.

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

It was a very calming place, but ultimately I'm happy that I live in a city and not out in the middle of nowhere.

[gillo]

I thought the scenery looked familiar - we've had holidays in Alsace, across the river. It's a beautiful area, isn't it?

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

It is indeed and I especially like the combination of the extremely flat Rhine valley and the rolling mountains. Plus - the food is good and the accent is charming.

[gillo]

My German is nowhere near good enough to identify accents, but the same can be said about the Alsace version of French. We loved Freiburg when we visited it.

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

Freiburg is a great place - you'll see some familiar sights in the next posts.