IN PICTURES: STRASBOURG, I LOVE YOU! 2,5 Days in the capital of Christmas

Last week, we went to spend a few days in Strasbourg, France, to discover this charming city we had never visited before and get ourselves in a Christmas mood. With the typical Alsacian buildings all over the city, the smell of Bratwurst, Flammeküche, Munster cheese and mulled wine around every corner and no less than 11 different Christmas markets, it didn't take long before we were singing Jingle Bells (not out loud of course, I already told you I can't sing).

The weather was great and the sun was shining almost the whole time, so it was the perfect occasion to try out my brand new camera. I got a Panasonic LX100 for my birthday and I'm soooo happy with it!

So let me take you on a journey throught this beautiful city and share my first pictures with you!

We start our trip at the east side of the city, at he Place de la République. Over here, you'll find impressive buildings like the National Library or the Imperial Palace.

A bit further, right behind the Opera, is Place Broglie and our first Christmas market. It's one of my favorite ones, with plenty of Christmas decorations and other cute (but expensive) stuff.

We continu walking in the same direction to get to Place Kleber, with the giant Christmas tree and the first typical Alsacian buildings.

From here it's a web of small alleys. We don't follow our map anymore and a bit later we arrive at the Place de la Cathedrale, with the magnificent Cathedral of our Lady of Strasbourg. It's still open so we take a look inside. It's nice but not a must-see and there's hundreds of people inside, like everywhere in the city. We clearly weren't the only ones who wanted to get in the Christmas mood!

It's getting dark and we're hungry so we start looking for a nice place for dinner. We soon find out that if you're looking for vegetarian food heaven, this is NOT the place to be. It was easier finding vegetarian food in the middle of China in a town where even the receptionist of our hotel didn't speak English! In Strasbourg, most restaurants don't even have one vegetarian dish and in the only one we find, a guy walks out telling us not to go there because it's horrible...

So we wander around a little more and my boyfriend is seduced by the Flammeküche on one of the Christmas markets (he does eat meat and loves smelly cheese). A Flammenküche is like a salty crèpe with cream, bacon and Munster cheese. I look around but the only vegetarian thing I find on the market are waffles and crèpes. Now I'm not the kind of girl that's gonna complain about eating waffles for dinner, so I order one. With Nutella AND whipped cream. Jummie!

The next day we decide to just wander around the town and do some Christmas shopping in the 'normal' stores and on the other Christmas markets.

In the evening we walk to Petite France, on the west side of the city, where we finally find 'real' vegetarian food in a restaurant called "La pince à linge", which means 'The clothes peg'. Before becoming a restaurant, it was a laundry. We eat Spätzle, which makes me all nostalgic because I used to eat this when we crossed Germany with my parents on our way to Hungary, Czech Republic, etc. It's delicious but I might not recommend it if you're on a diet... For me, with the waffle from yesterday, that's ruined anyway so I decide to go for it and just enjoy! :)

After dinner, we stroll through the streets of Petite France, which are just so picturesque...

Time flies by and before we know it, it's already the last day of our trip. We decide to visit Palais Rohan, which is right next to the Cathedral and houses the aercheological museum, the museum of decorative arts and the museum of fine arts. We also visit the Alsacian museum. There's a museum card which costs only € 12, while most museums cost around € 6 each. So with a card like that, it's hard to loose.

So that's it, that's how I spent 2,5 days in 'the capital of Christmas'. The city is lovely and so picturesque! I'd recommend it to everyone, but if you don't like crowds, you might not want to go around Christmas.

I used the free app that was offered to me by GPSmyCity to find my way around the city. It doesn't just help you locate yourself, but also proposes different thematic city walks and contains plenty of information about sights, restaurants, etc. All the most-known places are in it but there's also some hidden gems not everybody knows about. You can get it for free too, for the city of your choice, by simple leaving me a message here.

Here's some practical information about Strasbourg:

• Cheap hotels are really hard to find around Christmas. We'd booked 2 nights at the Mercure hotel near the 'Palais des congrès' and paid € 150 / night for a double room. The room was old-fashioned but very spacious, the personel is extremely friendly, breakfast was alright and the hotel is only 2 tramway stops from the city center and offers free parking (we drove to Strasbourg because it's only a 4,5 hours drive from where we live and we both have a free company car). Around Christmas, the city center is closed for traffic anyway, so it's difficult to get any closer without paying a fortune on parking.

• There's a tramway inside and around the city. We bought a 24-hours-card, which allows maximum 3 people to travel for only € 6,80. A single ticket costs € 1,60 per person.

So are you dreaming of going to Strasbourg? Or have you been there already? Tell me all about it in the comments!

#Sightsactivities #France #Strasbourg #Citytrip