Kintzheim - 04 May 2024

04.05 - Kintzheim - France 

Well, obviously tired enough as I slept well. We were both aware of the lock and movement of ships throughout the night. Think I recall a few boy racers whizzing by too!

This morning we went and watched and waited for the lock - a big barge called Max was waiting to go down. Amazingly fast to disperse so much volume of water. Tintin didn’t realize it was a double lock until later. 

Went for a short walk - wanted to see how small the Rhine was and why they’d had to build the Canal d’Alsace as the Rhine wasn’t navigable in that area. Wasn’t very impressive through the trees!

Tintin still driving today - I will drive before we go home! It’s just he enjoys it, I find it more of a challenge!

Lovely to see so many poppies on the roadside. Just about managed to capture the Statue of Liberty on the roundabout - we were coming from behind her!

And then at 12.30 - we hit a huge traffic jam on the motorway. Tintin decided to get creative and try a different route. Ha - traffic stuck everywhere - and we have no idea why. Our hour journey took two hours - very frustrating!

We took the small roads - lots of vines everywhere, and went through some pretty little towns - Bennwihr, Mittelwihr, Ribeauvillé, Bergheim, Rorschwihr, Saint-Hippolyte and onto Kintzheim. 

Had decided to go and see the Barbary macaques at La Montagne des Singes. Was €24 for us both. No discount for seniors here!

Fairly busy being a Saturday? We arrived just after 14.00, next feeding and explanations were at 14.15 - result. However, the lady spoke in French for ages, then German. I’d asked another helper if the talk would be in English - she said yes. Once the other lady finished, I asked the helper to ask if she’d do English too - she just shrugged her shoulders and walked off. The helper said they only do English for groups of people - how rude!

Anyway, stopped another young helper lad, who was happy to give us the gist of the talk in English. 

There are 4 separate groups of apes there. About 240 macaques there - if you want more information - see they notice boards I took photos of (the blue bits!). They were at the end of the walk - might have been more useful at the beginning for us who don’t speak the lingo!

We wandered around the walk area twice, because you always see more a second time. We saw all the trees near the front were electrified to stop the apes destroying those trees. 

They’re very mischievous. Lovely to watch the younger ones playing and tearing around. 

Tintin managed to get some good photos with his Panasonic - the older iPhones aren’t really much good on zoom - become too pixilated. 

Went back to Dave for a cuppa, and to decide which way we might go to get home. Our French AA road map is now too old to be useful 😉

We couldn’t park there overnight, so drove for all of about 5 minutes to another park. Both of us couldn’t understand why the reviews were good - we were in the wrong bit! There’s a small entrance from the parking which opens out into a level, spacious area. We are Billy no mates - just as we like it! With lots of birdsong. As long as the repetitive Chiff Chaff doesn’t go for it - then all good!

It’s been ok weather, warm in the sun, but chilly in the shade, just a few spits of rain.