Freiburg Finale

I'm already missing the warm coziness of Christmas. I'm not prepared to end this holiday season quite yet, which I guess is good since I still have a few European Christmas Markets to talk about! 

This is the finale of our three day trip to Freiburg, Germany for the Annual Christmas Market. It's still our favorite of all the Christmas Markets we've been to so far, two years running. (You can read my little tips and reviews of those market in the European Christmas Markets tab, soon to be fully updated for 2014.) If you remember from my last post on Freiburg, we began that Friday at the Freiburg Munstermarkt in search of our Cinderella brat, and then headed back for a last spin at the Christmas market to pick up a few last minute ornaments, presents, plates of food and a cup or two of liquid cheer before heading back home.

By Friday afternoon the market was really packed, which added quite a bit festiveness to the atmosphere, but also made maneuvering a little less seamless. Using a stroller would have been a nightmare, as was evidenced by those using them. In a crowded Christmas market such as Freiburg's babywearing was surely the way to go. Oswin was right in the action and loving the lights, accordion players, and all the people. It was as if she wasn't quite sure what to happily freak out about first.

It turns out the appropriate answer to her question was everything, absolutely everything at once. Talk about sensory overload for a little country girl!

We grabbed some warm beverages and striebele, which is very similar to funnel cake, and took in the crowd. I was sad to be leaving when the weekend was only just beginning, but happy we were able to squeeze in a trip, especially on such short notice.

Our times at the Freiburg Christmas Market will always be some of my fondest memories here in Europe. After almost five years it still blows my mind that we can hop in the car, cross country borders, and within three hours be eating brats and drinking liter beers in Germany. It used to take me longer to drive from my parent's house to Penn State for college! Being able to road trip truly opens so many avenues for travel in Europe, without the airline regulations or luggage restrictions, and I'm so thankful we've been able to take advantage of that.

I really hope that we can return to Freiburg for a third year of their Christmas Market and Friday Munstermarkt, especially now that we know where to find our favorite bratwurst, a decent cup of coffee, and late night spaetzel. Some people don't like to return to the same place twice, but for us it's a lot of fun. You learn the spots to go for this and that, and how to get around. We even stayed in the same apartment as we did the year before, and it felt a lot less foreign to us. It was nice to know what to expect of your living arrangement, especially when traveling with a baby.

I couldn't really end a final Freiburg post without showing the goods, could I now? This picture doesn't do justice to these cute ornaments, but you get the idea. Some wooden pine cones, walnuts and pretzels, some little wooden gnomes in knitted sweaters (I've name the old one Gandalf the Grey and the younger one Bilbo), a few wooden snowmen, and the start of our kitschy 70s looking ornaments collection. And yes, that is a ballerina pig you see: one for us, and one for Oswin's collection.We rounded out our haul by purchasing a bag of gluhwein spices, two large hurricanes for votive candles, a special light for atop the tree that is traditional to Freiburg (it looks atomic, which is great since I don't do stars on top of Christmas trees), and finally, after three trips to Germany, my very first Stein. Ahhh it was a good trip indeed.

We took a few days to recover from that little road trip, but not too long as we were heading to Montreux, Switzerland for their Christmas market. Which surprise surprise will be my next post. Stay tuned!

A la prochaine friends...

Honey 

A search for Cinderella at the Freiburg Munstermarkt

If there is something that travel has taught me, it's that the process will leave you always yearning for food and drink from distant (or not so distant) lands. I'll never stop food-lusting over the truffle gnocchi I had at a small restaurant outside the Duomo in Florence, or the dinner we had on a blustery January night in Lyon, or the wine we drank while staying at monastery-turned-spa in Monchiero Alto. Freiburg as well holds a little gem of food lust for Les Duggans. Dan and I have spent the last year dreaming of the brat we had at the Freiburg Munstermarkt, so naturally when we found ourselves there on Friday morning of our trip, it was a no brainer: brats for breakfast.

The only problem was, it was a bit like Prince Charming trying to find out whose dainty little foot fit the glass slipper. We couldn't remember which stand we had bought it from, only what side of the cathedral the stand was on, that it came from a white and modest looking stand, and what the brat looked like.

This was not the brat we were searching for. It was still delicious, but not our Cinderella Brat.

We began to fear that we would never find the stand. Or that it was no longer there. We scoped out all the stands on this side of the cathedral, and non were the stand selling our Cinderella brat. We took solace in that fact that we at least had the chance to have that brat once in our lives, and carried on with our shopping.

What? It can't be! It is! It's our little Cinderella stand! I threw around the idea in my mind that they were simply set up on the opposite side of the cathedral, but quickly shoved that thought. "That's too easy. This is Europe. It's gone forever," I thought. But no, alas here they are! Uhl's served us up the same amazing and herb filled bratwurst that we had remembered in our brat filled dreams, and we happily devoured them. So fast that there are no pictures to prove the tale, you'll simply have to take my word for it. In the end I don't know what was more pleasing: the taste, or solving the mystery.

The Freiburg Munstermarkt takes place every Friday outside of the cathedral, and you can find everything from plants to brats, jams and juices, herbs and spices, children's toys and household cleaning products (seriously, there was a broom stand). It's a lively market, and when we were there the school kids were all out for lunch and running around the square. I couldn't help but think how fun it must be to be a kid in Freiburg and spend your lunches in that square, and grabbing delicious hot food on Fridays with your friends. This market has a really special old world feel, and it made me want to do our weekly shopping. People on bikes carrying parcels, tables dedicated to solely selling walnuts, tiny live Christmas trees for sale...I wanted to just live in this market all day. But alas, we had some more Christmas Market going to tend to, and that's pretty awesome as well. We'll hopefully see you again next year Freiburg Munstermarkt!

Oh, and a little advice from those who have learned the hard way: when you have that meal, that meal that you know will haunt your dreams with dancing truffle gniocci or the like, always remember to take a picture of either the restaurant's sign or menu. That way you'll never have to search on an empty stomach for your Cinderella.

A la prochaine friends...

Honey 

Finally, some shopping.

It's amazing to me how fast things can change when traveling with children. We went from a screaming "I-think-we-might-need-to-go-back-to-the-apartment-this-is-getting-bad" overtired toddler freakout, to a "fast-asleep-in-the-sling-looking-like-a-little-angel-child" in a hot minute. And thank goodness, because none of us (I think Oswin included) really wanted to spend our first day in Freiburg holed up in the apartment, as nice of an apartment as it was.

And so our little Smaug took a 20 minute cat nap, all snuggled up with Mama in our sling. Which meant one thing: let's go buy some ornaments!

(And a gluhwein.)

We loaded up on wooden ornaments from one of my favorite stands, and bought a few of my favorite oranment: a wooden walnut. After almost five years of living here in SwitzerFrance walnuts have a new and special meaning to us, as there are many walnut trees growing in the Jura region. They pepper the landscape, influence the taste of the wine, and leave little delicious treats all over the road once the fall comes. I obviously had to pick up some more wooden walnut oranments to add to the collection, and at 2,50 euro a pop, it was a no brainer.

There was also a random crystal and mineral stand at the market. Dan says it was there last year, I just can't remember seeing it. They had some really well priced rose quartz pieces that were too pretty to pass up, but what I was most excited about were their geode slices. I've been coveting geode slices on etsy for awhile now, as I would like to use them as our new coasters, but all the ones I've found online have been pretty expensive. I grabbed a bunch of pink geode slices from this stand for a sixth of the price, and am pretty giddy about it.

We also picked up a beautiful olive wood soup ladle, which is something we've been needing for a long time as well. Time to let the measuring cups go back to being measuring cups! Hooray!

We were hoping to head back to the market Thursday night for an hour or so to grab dinner, but Oswin's afternoon nap had other plans. Dan went solo and brought some market food back to the apartment, and we watched Elf on the laptop. It was cosy and warm and not a bad way to end our first day at the Christmas Market.

Stay tuned for more on Freiburg!

A la prochaine friends...

Honey