Colmar

One of the most beautiful cities in France. Come to Colmar if you want to see a beautiful, traditional, medieval city.


The city itself is rather big, but the historical center is quite compact. Due to the large number of historic buildings built in a variety of styles, this is a real open-air museum. Use this map and in 2-3 hours you will visit most interesting places.


Every district in the city has some beautiful name: Little Venice, Fishermens' quarter, Tanners' quarter.










Colmar is considered the driest city in France due to low rainfall. Therefore winemaking is well developed here, I think everyone heard the expression Alsace wines (Vins d'Alsace). The Alsace Wine Road (https://www.facebook.com/route.vins.alsace) passes through the city.

A curious monument to General Lazare de Schwendi (1522-1583) is associated with the wine. He served the Spanish king and successfully fought against France. On the other hand it is believed that he brought the grapes from the Hungarian Tokay wine region and gave a start to the wine-making industry in the region. Actually, he holds the branch in his hand.


More recently, the wine here was called Tokay Pinot Gris. But in 1994 Hungary decided to ban the use of their name. Now such bans are quite popular, for example France has banned Ukraine from using the names champagne and cognac starting from 2025. Hungary did the same, France got a transitional period of 13 years, and since 2007 the word Tokay have disappeared from the names of Alsatian wines.


You can take pictures of literally every home, the perfect city for instagram. If you have less than 100 photos, then you have not seen everything. We highly recommend a stroll here.


The houses are in perfect, postcard condition. Of course, they were restored.


Throughout history Colmar belonged to France and Germany. And even despite the fact that most of the time it was French, the German population is dominated.














We noticed that there are various installations above the shops. Such a distinctive feature of the city.










And this little car is the sweetest thing we have seen in France.


Getting there: look for parking somewhere here N 48 04.567 E 7 21.767. There is a railway station Gare de Colmar, direct trains from Basel and Strasbourg. From Germany you can take the Euregiobus bus from Breisach, and Breisach can be reached by train from Freiburg. Find here timetable and booklet about this route.