Alsace & Lorraine

Wow, has it been a month? It seems there's nothing like the re-starting of full-time work to slow down the pace of blogging! April was a busy month, but there wasn't much to report on up until our trip last weekend to the Alsace and Lorraine regions of France, in the northeast of the country. This place had been on my must-see list for some time, so when the same professors who led the trip to Normandy last year announced they would also do this trip, we had to sign up! Like last year, several of our friends from Carl's school went along as well, so we had a nice little group to enjoy the trip with.

Alsace/Lorraine have at different times been part of both France and Germany, so both regions offers visitors a really interesting mix of the two cultures. Rolling hills, low mountains and several rivers also make it a very scenic area, so all around it's a very appealing place. In Alsace, we visited the cities of Strasbourg and Colmar, as well as the town of Riquewihr along the wine road where we got to sample some Alsatian wine. Also in this region was the World War II concentration camp of Natzweiler-Struthof, which was in a beautiful setting on a hilltop with amazing views, but despite that was obviously a rather depressing place.

In Lorraine, we visited the city of Metz, which I was a bit surprised to find was incredibly beautiful and had a very Roman feel to it. I'd never really heard much about the city before going there but I have to say it was probably my personal favorite of the places we visited, with Strasbourg a close second. Finally, also in Lorraine we visited Fort Hackenberg, an underground post along the Maginot Line, which was a network of fortifications built by France during the period between the first and second World Wars to defend against a German attack (obviously it did not succeed). It was another place that was in a beautiful setting but with a not so beautiful story behind it.

Photos:
#1 Strasbourg
#2 Natzweiler-Struthof
#3 Metz cathedral
#4 The University of Kent "gang" along with our trip leaders Dr. Palo and Madame Delsemme
#5 View from outside one of the installations at Fort Hackenberg