Picturesque Colmar among France's best towns, pt 1

Colmar has a population of roughly 70,000 with almost 200,000 in the metro area; the city is 40 miles SSW of Strasbourg and 40 miles north of Basel; the tourism office had an excellent city map with all of the highlights marked and helpful walking routes

This former Dominican convent, with its Gothic cloister considered the finest in Alsace, was completed in 1289; from the mid 19th century it has housed the Unterlinden Museum featuring the famous Isenheim Altarpiece

You can reach Colmar from Paris by train in just over 2 hours assuming there are no strikes; I had to adjust my visit based on an impending strike only to discover I'd made my hotel reservation one day off (the first of three booking snafus that summer)

Colmar was the birthplace of Auguste Bartholdi on August 2, 1834; one of the great French sculptors of the 19th century, Bartholdi is most famous for designing the Statue of Liberty; he died in 1904 and this monument was erected in his honor in 1907

This section of Colmar is aptly named Little Venice; Colmar is situated on the 110 mile long Alsatian Wine Route and considers itself to be the capital of Alsatian wine (famous for its dry Rieslings and other white wines)

Colmar was first mentioned by Charlemagne in his chronicle about Saxon wars and was granted the status of a free imperial city by Emperor Frederick II in 1226; the city has gone back and forth between Germany and France since the 1870s based on war victors

This statue by Auguste Bartholdi depicts Jean Roesselmann who was an imperial provost of the town of Colmar in the 13th century; he died during a victorious battle in 1262 defending the city against the Bishop of Strasbourg's supporters

The Bartholdi Museum is housed in the 15th century building where Bartholdi was born in 1834; this portrait of Bartholdi, completed when he was 16, was featured in the museum (they had English captions for the exhibits on request)

This Rhine Renaissance-style bourgeois residence built in 1609 is commonly called The House of Heads for the 105 grotesque masks that adorn its facade; in addition to a unique two story balcony, a bronze sculpture by Bartholdi crowns the gable

This statue dedicated to General Jean Rapp was Bartholdi's first major sculpture in 1854 when he was just 20; originally it was exhibited on the Champs Elysses in Paris and shown at the 1855 World's Fair before returning to Colmar

Erected in 1865, the Covered Market is open every day except Monday and features local merchants selling fruits, vegetables, meat, cheese, dairy, baked goods, fish and other high quality products

Built around 1350, Maison Adolph is considered to be one of the oldest buildings in Colmar; much of central Colmar is a car-free pedestrian area which I loved and made for a safer and more pleasant experience

A jewel of the Renaissance (1537), this residence was built for a wealthy hatter (amazing to think being a hatter could make you wealthy!); it's current name, Maison Pfister, comes from the merchant Francois-Xavier Pfister who purchased the home in 1841

Colmar is sister cities with Schongau (Germany), Princeton, Gyor (Hungary), Lucca (Italy), Eisenstadt (Austria), Vale of White Horse (UK) and Sint-Niklaas (Belgium)

In this photographer's heaven, it's a rare section of Colmar where the half-timbered buildings are painted white; flat-bottomed boats provide a 30 minute tour of some of the canals giving visitors a different persepective of the city

Buildings in the Tanner's District date from the 17th and 18th centuries and are narrow, deep and tall with half-timbering on the upper floors; the houses' roofs have hooks from which hides would hang to dry after having been prepared in the canal