Oct 4: Lure, Alsace

Our re-entry to France was a relief. We felt a familiar breath of relaxation once we were back on familiar roads. First night objective: Lure, the ancestral home of Grandma Banbury.It is a small town, not a village.

The region it composed of large farms and small factories. It is hilly, with nice tracts of woods separating the fields and pastures. The woods are mixed, conifers and deciduous, with a smattering of birch. The main topographical feature is the Vosges mountains, an ancient range that has eroded to hills. All in all an attractive area.

I won't relate the history of the region in much detail. It has been back and forth between Germany and France for centuries, was for many years part of the Holy Roman Empire, the King of Poland was for a while the Duke here. These facts are repeated in all accounts, but I was but able to understand why this is so. Were the reasons strategic, or economic? The religious issues were not significant. The protestant Germans and the Catholic French both made generous allowances for religious tolerance, except for the Jews. They were expelled in pogroms in the 14th century. To the locals it was clear that Jews were the cause of the plague and the massive earthquake on the Rhine Rift.

It is an area of big agriculture now, and for centuries has been mined for iron, lead, mercury, coal, and other minerals. Oldest and most important is the wine trade. This was the engine that drove big business from the age of the Renaissance to today. The rivers permitted transport to the big cities and to sea ports.

We drove the wine route for a ways, from Colmar to Ste Die. It is worth doing. About a zillion Germans agreed, this being a holiday weekend. One of these little towns is the second most visited in France. We missed it by mistake. The town we enjoyed is Colmar. It is remarkable to me in that it is still used as a town, not merely a tourist attraction. It is very large for such an old town, and on every new street you turn down you find another Renaissance treasure in the form of a merchant's home. The dates are usually carved into the lentels above the door. Some are well documented on plaques. All in all, a pleasant place to spend a day.

Here a word of warning. If you want a decent meal in France, don't expect one in the tourist towns. It is inconceivable to Americans how cynically bad some of the restaurants are. And how expensive. We continue to find dining out for less than $75 per person a futile pursuit.