The plan had always been for our daughter to spend a few days with family friends who live in France. What had not been fully planned was how the logistics of dropping her off and continuing our own route would feel in real time. She was excited. She had been looking forward to this piece of the trip. We were proud of her. We were also very aware that we were leaving our fifteen-year-old in another country with people she trusted and that by every available measure this was a wonderful thing, and that this did not stop it from feeling a little strange.
Basel Before the Handoff
We had a few hours before the afternoon drop-off, so we stopped in Basel. It is one of those European cities that operates entirely on its own terms, a place that manages to be genuinely world-class in art and architecture and civic life without requiring any particular acknowledgment from the rest of the world. We walked the old town, looked at the Rhine from the bridge, and had coffee at a place with outdoor seating where everyone was speaking three languages in the same sentence.
The kids are old enough to appreciate this kind of place now. The casual cosmopolitanism of a mid-sized European city used to be lost on them. This trip, I notice them noticing. That is one of the things you travel for.
The Goodbye
She had a backpack, her camera, a list of things to do in the city, and the confidence of someone who has been traveling internationally since she was young enough to not remember it. The friends who met us were warm and clearly excited to see her. She hugged everyone, including the two boys who pretended not to want the hug, and disappeared through a door in a French apartment building.
We sat in the car for a moment afterward. None of us said anything particularly meaningful. Then we got back on the road.
Into Alsace
The drive from eastern France into the Alsace region happens gradually, and then all at once. The landscape shifts, the architecture starts to look like Germany that went to art school, and the signage begins its characteristic dance between French and German place names. We were heading for Belfort, our overnight stop before continuing to Colmar in the morning.
The guesthouse was small, family-run, and entirely what the moment called for. We ate dinner at a restaurant where the menu listed tarte flambee, which is the Alsatian answer to pizza and is better than it has any right to be, given that it is mostly flatbread, creme fraiche, and bacon. We ate two of them. Then we went to bed.
Some travel days are about the places. Some are about the transitions. This one was about both, and about what it means to trust your children with the world a little more than you did yesterday.
Where We Went
Planning Your Own European Adventure?
This route through Switzerland, France, and Germany is one of our favorites, and the logistics are manageable with the right planning. Let us help you build it.
