Another day, another medieval village

In the incredibly fat file of “things we never quite get round to”, Going Places is really high on the list. Really high. It’s partly for real, practical reasons like lack of time, but mostly because we’ve never formed the habit (and that in turn has a lot to do with real, practical reasons like lack of time/money – we tend to have one or other, but never both – but mostly disorganisation compounded by hermit tendencies). And yet we always say how much we want to Go Places and Do Stuff. Weird.

Anyway so this weekend we actually did. Yesterday we headed up to a medieval village on the Rhine (and right on the German border) which was having a medieval festival – prime excuse for Elfling to wear her fancy dress, which was excuse enough for me to put it on the calendar. And today, with my dad’s partner visiting, we checked out another medieval village on the Rhine (but not the border, though we did briefly pass through Germany en route).

Kaiserstuhl, the lesser known of the two, totally wins. Small and simple as it is, it has charm and landscape and good looks in abundance. Stein am Rhein however… well. In general I’m quite okay with being a tourist among tourists. I’m not proud. If there are fun or pretty or cool things to check out, I will check them out, and naturally I expect to encounter others doing the same. But here, somehow, I found it cloying; I could only really enjoy little corners and details.

Maybe it’s just too Disney perfect to start with?

Or maybe it’s just that we didn’t get to go for a swim today… and ending yesterday with a splash at the badi was definitely a highlight. Dude agrees. His swimming lesson put him in an AWESOME mood.

Anyway. It was a lovely weekend, regardless. Incidentally a highlight of the medifest was this band – check out Armin’s video. Especially if you appreciate hot shirtless men in skirts. (As ever, he has better pics of everything else, too.)