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Alsace - What to do or avoid on Ascension day 5/29

Posted by on

Hello- I’ll be staying in Colmar with my wife and 3 year old son, from 5/26-5/30. We have a rental car.

I have since found out 5/29 is ascension day, and trying to make sure i don’t make a mistake in planning what to do on that day.

Some things we want to do that week… which should we specifically avoid doing on 5/29, and/or which might be best to do on that day?

  1. Drive to Koenigsbourg castle

  2. Train to Strasbourg, see the cathedral, little France, art museum, etc

  3. Spend time exploring Colmar itself on foot

  4. Drive to Explore villages around Colmar

  5. If all of these are very bad ideas for ascension day, maybe we would go for a drive within the Black Forest and make some stops

Thanks for any advice !!

Posted by
11910 posts

I think #4 is safe, also #2, #3 not so much. Driving through the Wine Route villages is beautiful. If I were you, I’d change my hotel from Colmar to one of the wine villages; we stayed in Riquewehr at L’Oriel

Posted by
7544 posts

I have no idea what will or will not be open that day. You can check the websites for the castle and cathedral to ensure they are open. To me, any of your ideas would be good for that day. If the castle is open you could visit some towns and the castle on the same day.

The castle is very impressive. When driving up to it don’t take the first parking space you see. It’s a long uphill walk to get to the castle. We got a spot very near the castle, so our walk was short. Also, leave nothing in sight in the rental car. When we were there there were signs stating some cars had been broken into.

Near Colmar is Eguisheim. It’s nice to walk around and near it are the 3 castles (ruins) of Eguisheim. You can walk to them from the town or drive to castles’ parking lot. From there it is a short walk to the ruins.

Posted by
2 posts

@Suki , for option 4, do you think that Ascension day will have too many shops / stores closed around the villages, or is it mostly just nice to stroll around and don’t need to really worth about shops / stores being open?

Posted by
10939 posts

If you were staying anywhere else in France, I'd say not to be concerned about closings. In all the rest of France, Ascension Day is just a long weekend where we get away, or we have a lot of tourists in our town. But Alsace has its own rules and exemptions, given its unique history. We do have one poster who lives in Germany near the border who could probably give you a closer account than anyone here. Unless there is one person who has actually been in Colmar on Ascension Day, you are getting best guesses.

Looking up opening and closing days at the sights you want to see will give you the info. As for shops, you can ask your hotel or rental host who are actually in Alsace. Where I live in France, nothing will be different, including public transportation, on May 29th.

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