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sitanshi talati-parikh

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Tag Archives: France

The Curious Colours of Colmar

30 Friday Sep 2016

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Publication: Verve Magazine, Travel Stories

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Alsace, Colmar, France, Interviews: Travel, Wine

Published in Verve Magazine, September 2016
Photographs by Falguni Kapadia

At the heart of the Alsace region in France lies a beautiful town that makes your heart sing. Colmar is the spot that makes you fall head over heels in love

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Brilliant splashes of colour on half-timbered houses is what makes Colmar breathe life into the cliche ‘picture-perfect’. But it’s the quaint lanes, stuffed with local shops and delicacies, the warmth of the Alsatian-speaking people and the stunning calmness that pervades the town that makes it other-worldly. A medieval setting, but without the drama of gnomes, toadstools and fairy dust, something Enid Blyton would use as inspiration for a magical novel series, perhaps. And yet, Colmar has lived in the time of practicality and realism of taxes and war and not of imaginative children’s tales. Ironically encouraging the toadstool shapes, the town tax at one moment in history was as per the surface area of the house on the ground; so the residents built homes narrower from the bottom and wider from the top.

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As you walk through the lanes, you are privy to some of the most eclectic structures; also, the timber inside is protected and cannot be removed or cut down. Christina Perri’s song pops into my head — Darling, don’t be afraid, I have loved you for a thousand years. I’ll love you for a thousand more — when I face centuries of European history in the bright vision that is Colmar.

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Johann, our river guide, is beaming from ear-to-ear, with a sense of pride in the beauty of his hometown. As he guides us through Little Venice, down the serene ‘green area’ on the river (with a silent zone) and under tiny bridges so low that you need to bend triple, you can’t help but find his exuberance for the surrounding infectious. While he tries to nudge information out about your city, he knows nothing can match up to his. When you buy a house on the embankment (and they cost a pretty penny), you buy a part of the river, which keeps the tiny water body private. It flows through the garden district of the town, and was once used to transport produce. Tax seems to have been quite an evasive issue, because the boats in the town are also flat — there was a tax on the part of the boat submerged in the water, so they were designed just deep enough to bring back vegetables. And as a protective gesture, the precinct of the old town once had a railing to prevent boats from entering the town at night, a worthy safeguard, perhaps as someone entering this lush space may fall promptly in love and set roots forever?

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The Rhine, which is now a partition between Germany and France, once formed a link between the two countries. Colmar, in the heart of the upper Rhine valley, turned French in the 17th century and changed nationality five times! In 1939, it was the first bit to be invaded by the Nazis and was the last important town to be freed in 1945, with practically no damage to boot. The town is a curious mix — though a happy one — of French and German culture, and the influences are evident everywhere. The ‘fashion street’ of the past has the motif carved in metal of the draper holding a stick to measure material. As you walk along, you can’t miss those of a lady holding a goose or a pig, with foie gras and sausage being popular products from the area. The latter can be tasted at a number of the local restaurants, including the multi-floor one, which has graphic art on the walls and is happily positioned in the city centre, called Le Fer Rouge. The Alsace region is the birthplace of foie gras, and the town is peppered with Michelin-starred restaurants, each rubbing shoulders with the other.

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The favourite local son, Bartholdi, the famous creator of the Statue of Liberty in New York, has his mark everywhere, including a smaller replica in the city! Besides a museum dedicated to him, there is also a Bartholdi fountain where he is holding grapes, because he is supposed to have brought back grapes from Hungary for the local Pinot Gris. Wine, not surprisingly, is like water in Colmar, which has been the wine capital of the Alsace region since the Middle Ages, when it used to export to Switzerland. Large quantities of local produce were shipped along the river to Strasbourg, and then onwards along the Rhine to the Netherlands, moving on to England, Scandinavia and the Baltic coast. For the Domaine Martin Jund winery, Sebastian Jund, a fourth-generation viticulturist, shows us his cellar and takes us through the various in-house specialities. “Local wine represents the culture and people of the area.” Producing off 80 hectares of land, without pesticides and chemical products, they work with seven different grapes. White wine is the popular local drink of choice, we discover, and the hand-pressed grapes, stored in their own cellar, are sold mostly locally at around 50,000 bottles a year. We tasted four wines: the fruity Muscat sugarless, the spicy grape Gewurztraminer, the Sylvaner and a dry Riesling. As we swirl the home-grown liquid around in our glasses, we learn that they never drink alone, always with family. As Jund says, “With wine, it’s not about the right word or right place; it’s about having a good time and comforting your personality.”

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That’s what the town is about — local character with a ‘country’ atmosphere. For instance, the tale associated with the watchtower in the iconic Gothic monument with a striking coloured tile roof, the Église Saint-Martin church. As legend goes, a watchman was required to stay in the tower for one year at a time and not come down. But as a lot is required to keep a man busy, besides keeping a lookout, he was also a shoe repairman…and footwear was sent up to be fixed via a pulley system! Stories and folklore abound, the town swells with the high notes of history. And as we wind down with dinner at La Maison des Têtes, we are surrounded by tables that reverberate with a sense of the familiar, and we can’t help but feel the beat of the infectious camaraderie that suggests lasting friendships.

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La Maison des Têtes (House of Heads), a fine example of Renaissance architecture in the centre of Colmar, is actually built from the stones of the first wall in the town in the early 13th century. It is possibly the most famous local house, with intricate sculptural adornment — decorated as it is with 106 grimacing heads. The building that conveys ‘an idea of the wealth of the merchant class’ was restored in 2012. While many remains from the prehistoric town are around, you are not likely to find them in Colmar, probably because of the river that would have washed away the pieces. The facade of La Maison des Têtes was built in the early 17th century and one part was used for praying. Today, it opens into a charming hotel with sumptuous-sized rooms and a fine-dining restaurant. With history surrounding you, you find yourself at peace in this abode, a perfect place for a romantic sojourn, to dwell amid the thoughts of the past and the mystery of the present, to the sounds of classical and jazz music flooding the town during festival time and the sweetness of the jam made from the fruit of the wild rose tree.

 

European Rhapsody

22 Monday Sep 2008

Posted by sitanshi talati-parikh in Publication: Verve Magazine, Travel Stories

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Cappadocia, Europe, France, Greece, Ice Hotel, Interviews: Travel, Santorini, Sweden, Turkey, Uchisar, Venice, Versailles, Verve Magazine

Published: Verve Magazine, Travel, September 2008

Sitanshi Talati-Parikh wanders far from the madding crowd in search of the most spectacular European spots for a destination wedding

Travel07

As the bridal season rolls in, everything needs to be perfect – the perfect ring, the perfect outfit, the best guest list, the most gorgeous honeymoon. But the wedding – that is the crucial, quintessential area of importance. Should we stay in or get out? Destination weddings have become the flavour of the season, more important than outfits and honeymoons – which are a given. What with a British couple getting married at 1,000 feet atop airplanes, Star Wars and fairy tale characters’-inspired wedding attire and a groom skydiving to tie the knot in Bhubaneswar; the bizarre is the flavour of the season. To find that eternal, exquisite destination, you just need to think bigger and more exclusive. Forget flowers and centrepieces, it’s the ambience and old-world charm of palaces and castles, or a simple sunset that forms the perfect backdrop to that ultimate moment which needs to be embedded in our memories forever.

It is said to be the most magnificent sunset in the world – and it may just be true. There are very few places in the world where you can stand atop a craggy piece of land and say your vows in front of the tangerine sunset straddling a dormant volcano floating on the ocean. Wedding parties fly in specially to get married in front of the Santorini sunset, and a breathless bride and groom hold hands and wait in anticipation for the exact moment when the sun sets and flashes a myriad colours across the Grecian sky, at which moment, they become man and wife. That is the starting point of a journey, where people are always looking for something special, or actually going that extra mile – literally and metaphorically, to make the event a day to remember. While Santorini appears to be the most magical spot in the world, so purely a thing of nature, consider having a beautiful ice wedding.

From volcanic sunshine to icy blue environs – with a chapel carved out of ice every year, and special custom-made ‘ice’ wedding packages, it is possible to be a real Scandinavian Ice Princess, in Jukkasjärvi, Sweden, a small village 200 km north of the Arctic Circle. No two chapels are quite the same in this unique location, as the chapel itself eventually melts away into the River Torne. Whether you choose matching ski suits, kilts or the traditional wedding attire, having a wedding at the IceHotel is an experience for all present.

If ice doesn’t do it for you, and a princess you still want to be, then simply think like the Mittals – and Versailles. The ‘fairy tale’ wedding of Lakshmi Mittal’s daughter Vanisha that was broadcast all over the world with much fanfare, or Eva Longoria’s wedding reception, were both held at the Vaux Le Vicomte Château, in Versailles, France. The historical 17th century masterpiece is replete with fountains and lush gardens, exquisite furniture, period decor and crackling fires in antique fireplaces – quite the place to warm the soul! With a host of movies shot at this fabulously grand location, it is also enough to make you feel like a movie star. Think Marie Antoinette (but of course with a ‘happily ever after’ instead)!

Talking about fairy tales, you are immediately transported to Venice – the land of entrancing (though a tad smelly) gondolas and beautiful churches. One of the most romantic cities in the world, reminiscent of Juliet being serenaded by Romeo, it is the perfect place for a classic wedding in an Italian palazzo or in the ambience of a church with famous paintings of Titian and Michelangelo as guests of honour. ‘Period Residences’ that date back to the 1500s, like Palazzo Abadessa, with frescoed ceilings, authentic antiques, and paintings from the Tintoretto school, welcome wedding parties.

Gorgeous Capri of Mediterranean blue sea, picturesque white sail boats, limestone masses and villa-lined promenades is one of the most typically beautiful spots – a spectacular alternative to the white Cycladian architecture of Greece – with the simplistic beauty of its coastline. Capri was the destination of choice for celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck and Gelila Assefa’s wedding, at the Grand Hotel Quisisana, which draws inspiration from Mediterranean art and lifestyle, whilst intrinsically remaining an Italian hotel. Getting married amidst the ruins of imperial Roman villas (think Villa Jovis) promises to be an experience.

Recalling Diane Lane in the movie Under the Tuscan Sun, where we realise it is easy to fall in love with wine country (and possibly a hot Italian), and nothing more is really required to have a rollicking country wedding. Breathtaking countryside, art, sculpture and the misty haziness of wine come together to serenade you in style. Winding down grass roads and one-horse towns, where your visitors may actually get lost or never find their way back home, with simple guitar-strumming and sultry afternoons of free wheeling time, it’s all about a sedate wedding at a villa in Tuscany.

If natural beauty is your thing, then having a wedding amidst the backdrop of the fairy chimneys, mushrooms, and unusual land forms of Cappadocia, is inimitable. Reminiscent of the bizarre backdrops in Star Wars, this Turkish phenomenon is best experienced from the painstakingly put together Museum Hotel located at the area’s highest point, Uchisar. With the grand hotel made out of the local insulated rock, many local ancient heirloom and antique pieces decorating the place and a gorgeous heated swimming pool with a breathtaking view of the Goreme Valley to boot, it is not surprising that the hotel is the favourite haunt of movie stars and celebrities, and an ideal location for an exotic wedding celebration; as the sun sets over the land forms, enveloping them in myriad hues.

This is merely the tip of the proverbial iceberg. From Bavarian mountains in Germany to the ‘sound of music’ hills of Salzburg, from the little cozy mountain chalets of Switzerland, to the Baroque architecture of Eastern Europe; going exotic is a truly memorable way to tie the knot.

|  Filling the gaps between words.  |

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