Colmar's Musee Unterlinden

Alsace has been a contested place for centuries. The place names say it all: Musee Unterlinden. There is hardly a more German word than unterlinden. Unter den Linden...the great boulevard of Berlin.

Boulevard.... Language is contested ground too, and Europe is a most interesting place to observe it. So much diversity, so much proximity of historically different languages and cultures, so much communication and intermingling as never before. English is the new lingua franca, I like to say.

The Musee Unterlinden in Colmar is a wonderful little museum, part local history, decorative and fine art, weapons and military matters, music and musical instruments, wine-making, and more. It is one of the more enjoyable "local" museums we have visited.

Giant wine barrels

There are many fine paintings, including this,

said to be France's only Cranach, his Lutheran

allegory Melancholie

But this museum's surpassing masterpiece is Matthias Grunewald's Isenheim 
altarpiece, seen here from above; it takes an entire hall to display its many parts; 
Schongauer's pupils, would-be pupils, and admirers included Durer and

Michaelangelo, among others

One side panel depicting events in the life of Jesus

Crucifixion

A model of the massive polyptych

Annunciation

Sculpture centerpiece

Alas, the Hell/nasty creatures panel was getting a cleaning

Cute and cuddly 15th century nightmare

But there were other things to see; here a glass harmonica, one of only a few 
thousand known, invented by one Benjamin Franklin, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Jesus float from the Easter Parade

Colmar

We drove into nearby Colmar the next day to see the old Medieval town, its Eglise and Unter Linden Museum.

In the Eglise St. Martin, looking toward its masterpiece

Martin Schongauer's Virgin of the Roses; we'll see more of 
Schongauer, a predecessor to both Durer and Michaelangelo

On the back side of the triptych, an image we liked

Colmar's cathedral

One of the many big squares

Along a canal

In the Little Venice district (what, your town doesn't have a
Little Venice district?!)

Ditto, with an ultra-quiet electric-motor-driven gondola ride

So we walked past this restaurant and watched this guy making 
tartes flambees and we were hungry and one thing led to another 
and

Voila! Tart flambee; sort of an Alsatian pizza, tomato sauce replaced by onion 
and lots more meat and cheese than any Italian pizza would include; another 
dish to add to our home repertoire

A beautiful old town, very walkable, scenic, well cared-for; 
and quite affordable, compared with some of the places we 
have visited recently

Riquewihr in the Alsace

From Beaune we headed back east to the Alsace, more great wine country (and sausage and other things), to the little beautifully-preserved Medieval village of Riquewihr, a few miles from Colmar, and headquarters of the great Alsatian negociant, Dopff Irion. We spent the night there, as at Beaune, in a free municipal camperstop. The pix are just scenes in Riquewihr, which we enjoyed very much.

Hotel-Dieu

The Beaune charity hospital, the Hotel-Dieu, was founded in 1443, and operated continuously for centuries. Now it is simply a great museum of life in late Medieval times and of charity and human kindness.

The exterior is not particularly impressive; but the interior

courtyard, with its weathervanes and tiled roof is most

impressive; the Hotel-Dieu must be in the Guiness Book

for most weathervanes on a single building...

The main ward

Detail

Gorgeous ceiling

Surgical--ouch!--instruments

More ditto; or possibly for lubicating your transaxle

Intensive care; aka, rich person's ward

In the kitchen, a spit-timer

Part of the Hotel-Dieu's historic endowment was several

hundred acres of prime (i.e., grand cru) vineyards; Hospices

de Beaune is one of the greatest of wines; and the annual

Hospices de Beaune auction is still the largest of all wine 

auctions

In the hospital's pharmacy

Producing whatever's good for whatever ails

you

The Hospices' artistic masterpiece, Roger van der Weyden's

15th century Last Judgment polyptych

Funny Beaune

Patriarche: Visiting Des Caves

I did the Patriarche wine-tasting tour in 1989, while Vicki and Rebecca and Rachel shopped. For a wine neophyte, it was quite an experience. Now I am simply lazy, thirsty, in the market for a bargain, and happy to reconnect with the past. So I did the Patriarche tour again. (Patriarche is one of the largest Burgundy negociants...blenders and marketers of fine wine.) Hey, 13 wines, including a few really good ones, for 10 euros?! It was a slow day, and I had the place pretty much to myself.

Patriarche

Entering the caves; I have forgotten how many acres beneath
Beaune Patriarche owns, but it's quite a walk just to see the
parts open to the public

Halls and halls like this

And this

Meursault, my favorite Burgundy white; my favorite white

wine

One of the best years ever

Finally, the first of the tasting areas; you get 3 whites and

10 reds; the big difference between now and 20 years ago

is back then they had people staffing these areas; nowadays--

ha!!!--it's self-serve, with just a few staffers circulating and

making conversation (and making sure you aren't stuffing

the '47 Gevrey Chambertin into your jacket)

If you're a real wine cognoscenti, you oxygenate, sniff, taste

with all parts of your mouth, then spit it out into one of these

little jugs; and make notes in your wine journal; I find the

expectorating part really difficult, but previous experience

has taught me it's best to taste and spit out the cheap stuff

(anything under $30 a bottle) so that you can really appreciate

the fine stuff

Not the cheap stuff; I had to get several helpings to really

discern its quality; ditto with the Pommard and Rully and

the Chassagne Montrachet

And of course the Meursault; ah, the soft amber glow...

I was glowing a bit myself by the time I

reached the last of the tastings

Hey, if it's good enough for the Sun King, it's good enough

for me