Celebrating in Strasbourg

First things first - I apologize for the delay in posting. Our apartment was struck by lightening and fried our modem, thus I've been without access to the Internet.

As many of you know, I have the most amazing husband. Period. Instead of a new outfit, something for the house, or flowers he gave me something sooooooo much better for my birthday - a fabulous weekend in Strasbourg, France. Ohhhhh Strasbourg, drink it in. It always goes down smooth. (A direct quote from the husband.)

If we'd gone right, we would have ended up in Paris....how great is that?

We hit the road Friday afternoon. And by hit the road I mean HIT THE ROAD. We finally had the opportunity to let The Audi run free on the Autobahn reaching speeds upwards of 120. Don't worry, I had my seat belt on (although I'm not sure what good a seat belt would do if you get in an accident going that fast). With that said, we arrived at the fabulous Sofitel Strasbourg in just about 2 hours.

After getting settled in our room, we hit the town in search of a place for dinner. Random side note - in the square about a block from our hotel a group of people were protesting the Iran election results. Nothing too crazy but it was definitely interesting to see. Moving on - we picked a cute restaurant that had seating available outside. I had one of the best lamb shanks I've ever tasted. Yum!

While dinner was great, the next part was A-A-A-AMAZING!!! The main tourist attraction in Strasbourg is the Cathedral de Notre Dame. We'll see more of the Cathedral later, just know this - when you see it, you have one of those "ahhh-haaa" moments. Pretty incredible. We stopped at a cafe that was right out in front of the Cathedral and each of us ordered a creme brulee and an Irish coffee. While admiring the church, we overheard a man behind us struggling to order some whiskey from the very French waiter. He finally gave up and settled for some scotch. We joked with him wondering what they put in our Irish coffee if they didn't have whiskey (and we still don't know but it tasted good). We ended up chatting with him and his wife for several hours. They gave us a bunch of tips on places to visit while we're here in Europe as well as the places to skip. Great people, great conversation and a great view....doesn't get much better than that.

Irish Coffee and Creme Brulee....yummy! Not a bad view either.

Cathedral at night

We had a light breakfast of croissants and coffee (no wonder French people are so skinny, where are the bacon and eggs people?) then made our way over to the Cathedral. There is just so much to it. Sure, it's big but that's not really what makes it so amazing. It's in the details. Words won't do it justice so enjoy:

Pretty incredible, huh? What was crazy was that right after we walked around inside they ushered everyone out because someone was getting married there! Can you imagine?

After the Cathedral, we made our way over to the La Petite France area. Most of the buildings and houses here are built with the half timber design and it is quite a sight to see. We enjoyed lunch near the river (not right next to it because the waiters at that restaurant were too snooty) then more sight seeing. We picked up some delicious chocolates for our neighbor that was keeping Stella....ok, and maybe a few for ourselves. By late afternoon we were worn out and decided a powernap before dinner would be a good idea.

To really celebrate my birthday, we splurged and had dinner at GoH, a schnazzy little place that was in the Sofitel. The menu we selected was a journey in itself, to say the least. Foie gras over strawberries, sardines over lima beans with fried potato slices, who thinks of this stuff? Fortunately, we're pretty adventurous when it comes to food so we really enjoyed it. Since it was our last evening, we wanted to take one more walk around town....and Brad was craving a crepe. We went to a creperie near the Cathedral and gorged ourselves, once again.

Random funny story - on our walk back to the hotel we saw a group of people all dressed up having cocktails out on the balcony overlooking the main square. We thought "can you imagine going to extravagant parties in Strasbourg, France. Hanging out on the balcony sipping cocktails and mingling. What a life." But I don't think everyone there understood the invitation where I'm sure it said something along the lines of "dress up." The women wore cocktail dresses and the men were in suits.....well, most of them. As we sat there secretly envying these people, out walks Superman. I kid you not, full out Superman costume!! Absolutely hilarious!

And that pretty much sums up the trip. We slept in the next morning before heading home to our excited puppy. I couldn't have asked for a better birthday!!