Colmar is the third largest city in the Alsace after Strasbourg and Mulhouse and the last stop on our tour of the region. I've been procrastinating on writing about the city for a while now, but it's time that I wrap up our trip of the Alsace, so here it goes.
We spent two nights there in the fall of 2021 and used the city as our base camp to explore the other small towns in the greater surrounding area.
The city is quite large and has many hotels to choose from which gives you more options to stay at and makes it much cheaper than the smaller towns like Riquewihr or Kayserberg. The small towns are lovely but you may have to pay double the price in some cases.
The main draw to Colmar though is its large and really well preserved old town. I'd say that it is a definite must see location in the region.
The old town is probably where you're going to want to spend all of your time if you do decide to visit because the rest is just your basic modern city.
There is a lot to explore in the old town though, including a ton of little shops selling local wears and delicacies.
There are also a lot of museums and monuments, as well as a couple of churches and more than a few historic buildings.
Fun fact, some of the buildings even make an appearance in the Anime movie called Howl's Moving Castle, like the one seen in the photos above and below.
Maison de Têtes, or house of heads, is another relatively famous house to view.
It was built in 1609 and I think it has been converted into a museum of some sort. On the outside there is a facade that is covered in carved or sculpted heads. Each one is unique so its kind of a cool building.
I liked the exterior decoration on this restaurant as well. So many watering cans! You don't see that sort of thing in modern cities.
The weather for us was a bit gloomy so most of the colors of the buildings are subdued in the photographs but we did manage to get a little sun in the afternoon, luckily.
The colors tend to pop a little more when you get the right lighting.
Okay, now for a few of main attractions in the old city quarters.
Petite Venice
Petite Venice is the most popular spot to see in town and the most widely photographed.
It's recognized for its canals and the row of colorful buildings that line its sidewalks.
Most people gather on two bridges that span the main canal and everyone takes photographs of the same location. If you Google Petite Venice I'm sure there will be 100 of the exact photos above and below.
It's a really nice spot even though my photos are a bit drab because of the gloomy grey skies.
You can see the location by boat as well. It isn't something that we did but I'm sure it would give you a nice vantage point of buildings.
I don't know how long the ride is or how much it cost so I can't tell you if it's worth the money.
You can see a lot of the canals from the sidewalk also, but eventually you do hit a spot that can only be accessed by the boats.
I do wonder what you see down that way.
If you travel up the road a bit you come to another bridge with another cool lookout spot.
I believe this part is still considered to be within Petite Venice but but I'm not 100% sure about the areas boundary.
Nonetheless it's a good spot to take pictures.
This seemed like it would be a nice spot for dinner as well. Especially if you could get a table on the terrace on the water.
Tanners Quarters
Just around the corner is another spot worth checking out called the tanners quarter.
It has a smaller canal that is completely surrounded by flower boxes and is sort of an oblong square where a bunch of restaurants and bars are located.
Something to keep in mind when visiting Colmar is that restaurants completely book up for dinner time. We learned this the hard way after being rejected by 6 to 8 restaurants we tried to enter. You definitely need to make a reservation in advance.
This is just a guess but I think it's because everyone, tourists and locals alike, probably all eat supper in the old town. There likely just isn't enough restaurants to accommodate everyone. As such, I highly recommend calling ahead.
We eventually found a table. The restaurant was nice and homey feeling but admittedly, the food was pretty substandard.
Other Stuff
Wandering around the old town I stumbled upon this familiar looking fountain of a little man peeing. No one was around taking pictures which I thought was hilarious because the exact same statute can be found in Brussels Belgium and its one of the main monuments in that city - Manneken Pis. It's always surrounded by dozens of people taking photos. Kind of funny how that works.
Speaking of duplicate monuments, there is also a really tall statue of liberty in Colmar. I didn't get a picture of it though because it's in a terrible location for viewing. It's located far from the old town along a major street in the center of a round-about. We saw it breifly from our car while driving to a different town in the Alsace.
At Petite Venice there are a bunch of red heart shaped locks attached to the fence along the water. They're pretty cheap looking and the inscriptions are all written in permanent marker. My wife and I joked that the shop across the street probably has a key to unlock them all and when they run out of stock they just grab a few and wash off the marker with nail polish remover and resell them again and again. Who would know?