Wandering Stars: 9th August 2012

8th August

Our target today is Strasbourg, home of the European Parliament. We only had about 32 miles to go according to miss satnav. Nice easy drive till we got to the city itself, motorway was busy but nothing awkward for me to contend with. There had been a couple of problems with roadworks but we were allegedly only about a mile from the aire so nothing could possibly go wrong. 'Turn right' said the satnav and there was the aire sign. Disaster then struck.

Just a few yards from the aire entrance they had erected a width restriction of only 2.2 metres, Ruby is 2.3 metres. I had already noticed another van turning round, we had to do the same and try to find another way in. We were getting nowhere so Lynda went to ask some workmen by a factory entrance where the aire entrance had got to. She was invited into the office to talk to a chap who spoke reasonable English. He explained that the aire had been moved and showed her on his cctv monitor that the new aire was completely empty. As this is, as far as we know, the only aire in the area it was obvious that no one else could find it either.

So, switch to plan 'B'. We used our Bord Atlas book for the first time and found a Stellplatz (aire) at Kehl, only about 3 miles away. Got here just fine and parked up. Its 6 euros per night plus 50 cents per kilowatt of electricity.

We had no change for the ticket machine so went off in search of shops, we needed some supplies anyway. Lynda asked someone for directions and a walk of about half a mile brought us to the town centre. Kehl is quite a big place with a lot of shops, pavement cafes etc We got a map in the tourist information office and asked directions to a supermarket.
We bought all we needed at a bakers and in the supermarket including a bottle of rose wine for Lynda - that 3 litre box we bought a short time ago didn't seem to last long! We have been trying to learn a bit of German via our 'Fast German in a day' cd course. Obviously Lynda has been paying more attention than me because I was quite impressed at how she asked for a paid for things in shops.

After a coffee at a pavement cafe, only 4.60 altogether, we wandered back to the van to have a very late breakfast - nearly midday already. A bit of a rest for a while I think, we have had quite a busy morning all things considered. Tomorrow we plan to get the bus and tram into Strasbourg city centre.

Looking at the map it doesn't look far at all to the Rhine so we decided we would go and take a look. Just a 5 minute stroll from the stellplatz brought us to the banks of the Rhine for the first time. As its a lovely hot, sunny day there were plenty of people sunbathing on the riverside grass. I knew from the off that Lynda had an ulterior motive for wanting to walk this way. The main railway station was not far away and Lynda is keen, if not desperate, to get an English newspaper. We got to the station, quite a lot of newspapers but the only English language ones were American (USA Today etc) and she didn't want one of those. In the end she bought a copy of 'Cosmopolitan', a sleazy womens magazine.

We have seen a bit more of Kehl now and we are very impressed, really quite a big place with all sorts of shopping streets, mostly pedestrianised. As usual we had a look in the church in the centre of town, quite modern inside.

As I type this its about 16.30 and we are sitting in the van having a bit of a 'livener' after our exersions.

9th August

We had just got our first cup of tea of the day when a car arrived on site and the driver started to ring a handbell out of the window. Our first thought was croissants of course. I only just stopped Lynda leaving the van in her pyjamas so keen was she to get our breakfast. I managed to persuade her to put her dressing gown on just in time!

We were all ready for our trip to Strasbourg this morning, there are instructions on how to get there posted on the noticeboard at the stellplatz. We got bus no 21 from outside the town hall and got off 6 stops later at the tram stop in the Strasbourg suburbs. Tram 'D' took us the rest of the way, right into the city centre. Total cost for our trip was only 3 euros each for a return ticket, really cheap way of getting around.

We soon found our way to the tourist information office for the all important map. If you have read this blog before (surely everyone has!) you will know that if it comes to a choice between walking round a city or taking the tourist train the train will always win. We bought our tickets (5.50 euros each) at the kiosk then went in to the cathedral to have a look round - our train ride was not for another half an hour or so.

As you can see from the photos the cathedral is very impressive. There were quite a lot of people inside with many organised tours making their way round. We certainly didn't do the cathedral justice - we only had time for a quick look because our train ride was coming up.

Tourist train trip takes about 40 minutes and covers most of the main sites of interest. Luckily there is a set of headphones for every passenger giving a commentary in a choice of 6 languages. There were quite a few American tourists in the city, first time we have heard American accents since we were at the WW2 sites in Normandy. Also plenty of Brits on the train that had obviously come from a boat on the Rhine and spent most of their time discussing their next cruises. Probably not our best tourist train trip - all very slow, but it gave us a good introduction to the city.

All this sightseeing helps you build up an appetitie and we were soon looking for a suitable place to eat. I do my best to spend the minimum amount of cash most of the time but I thought we would go mad this time. We chose a lovely restaurant right opposite the cathedral, with a table right at the edge so that we could 'people watch' while we ate. Lovely meal, we both had 'dish of the day' which was a slice of pork with mushrooms and green beans. For afters I had apple strudel with ice cream while Lynda had blackberry tart with ice cream. To drink we had a glass of kir royal Champagne each (11 euros apiece!) plus I had a beer later too while Lynda finished off her bottle of water. Total price was 63 euros plus tip which I didn't think was bad at all considering the location.

So, what to do next? If we were 'proper' tourists we would have done our homework and would know in advance what we wanted to see or at least skim through some of the leaflets from the tourist office. Obviously Strasbourg is the home of the European Parliament and lots of other important organisations, everyone knows that. Unfortunately a quick look at the map showed that the parliament buildings are quite a way out of the city but I read somewhere that you can get a boat trip that will take you for a look at the various buildings.

We made our way to where you buy boat tickets and found a very long queue snaking round and more queues to actually get on the boats. I don't queue unless I absolutely have to so that was chance of a trip to the European Parliament over.

After more shopping we made our way back to the tram stop and very soon were back at the stellplatz, very good, if tiring, day.