3-Country Buying Tour Game- France, Switzerland, and Germany Suggested by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

3-Country Buying Tour Game– France, Switzerland, and Germany:

 

Alsace (France)

Basel (Switzerland)

Stuttgart (Germany)

Suggested by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

In France:

Strasbourg –

Capital of the European Parliament

(The elected officials are here.  The bureaucrats are in Brussels, Belgium.)

-Beer Steins

-Moselle Glasses with green stems

Château de Haut-Koenigsbourg

-Books about Falconry and Heraldry

Riquewihr

-Kathe Wolwert Christmas Store here is open all year. 

The headquarters for this store is in Nuremberg, Germany.  They sell wooden nativity scenes, tin Christmas tree ornaments, and probably Mobil wooden toys for children.

-checked tablecloths, napkins, aprons, and placemats

Colmar

-The Issenheim Altarpiece in the Unterlinden Museum is the main reason for visiting this museum and the Madonnas carved in wood

-Canals run through town making it a Little Venice

-Colmar is the wine capital of Alsace, which is known for dry and fruity Rieslings

-Art books at the Unterlinden Museum

-Caraway Seeds to go on Muenster Cheese back in the US

Switzerland

Basel

-Group Banking Introduction to Swiss Financial Products?

-Fondue lunch with Fendant du Valais wine from Switzerland

-Cow bell souvenirs

-Rolex watches

-Mont Blanc pens with GPS

-Cartier Jewelry

Germany

Freiburg – Black Forest

-Hand carved Cuckoo Clocks

-Beer steins

Stuttgart –

Car Capital, Wine Growing Area (Riesling), and Chocolate Manufacturing Town (Ritter Sport)

-Ritter Sport can arrange factory tours

-Baltic pearls

(In the same stores sell Mont Blanc pens and Rolex Watches)

-Group Banking Introduction to German Financial Products?

-Porsche Museum

-USB-Ports with toy Porsches on the end

-Mercedes-Benz Museum

Both Porsche and Mercedes-Benz have their main manufacturing facilities here. All other German carmakers have sales rooms, too.

-Audi – luxury car brand made by VW

-VW

-BMW

-Metzingen and Brueniger Land 

Malls with Designer Clothes and Accessories

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Guigone de Salins: The Burgundy Touring Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Guigone de Salins:  The Burgundy Touring Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget 

Guigone de Salins was the wife of the Burgundian lawyer and diplomat Nicolas Rolin, who negotiated treaties on behalf of the Dukes of Burgundy.

Guigone was the descendent of an Italian family, who had been made nobility in France for the amount of money they brought into the kingdom.  Italian women had a higher literacy rate than French women to take of the trade interests of their families.

Italian women also managed several estates while their husbands were abroad.

When Guigone de Salins was widowed, she managed the Hospices de Beaune, which was a free hospital for vineyard workers.  The Hospice is in operation today.

The famous wine auction at the Hospices de Beaune is still attended by royalty and moviestars helps pay for free health care for Burgundian wine workers.

I have posted 7 blogs on this Savvy Mom Ruth Paget website about the suggested cities to visit on a tour of Burgundy below:

Burgundy Tour

-Dijon

-Vézalay

-Autun – Cathedral

-Autun – Lunch

-Hospices de Beaune

-Cluny Abbey

-Clos de Vougeot

This tour could be spread out over 1 to 2 weeks, especially during hot summer months.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting Ile-aux-Moines (Brittany, France) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting Ile-aux-Moines (Brittany, France) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

One of our friends in Paris had a family home on the Ile-aux-Moines (Monks’ Island) off the coast of Vannes in Brittany, France.

On a crisp, fall day, my husband Laurent, toddler Florence, and I set out for Vannes to pretend to be banished fishermen on the Ile-aux-Moines.

No cars are allowed on the island, so we trudged all of Florence’s toddler equipment (tricycle, helmet, multiple changes of clothing, sippy cups and so on) onto the island by making several ferryboat trips back and forth in the rain.  (It rains all the time in Brittany in the winter.)

Our friend’s family had a medieval era stone house on the island that was very chilly in the rain.  (Homes in Brittany all have very pointy roofs to let rain fly off roofs quickly and far away from homes.)

I told our friend that she needed tapestries from Aubusson to hold in heat.

“It’s never warm in here. Tapestries would hold in the cold,” she said.

Florence wore layers of little T-shirts and American sweatsuits that my University of Chicago roommate wisely bought for her when I came to show off “bébé Florence” to the good-looking Greeks in Chicago.

We forgot our chills when our friend came back with spiny lobsters for each of us.

She made a bowl of homemade mayonnaise to spread on baguette toast to go with the lobster meat.  We drank a Bourgogne Aligoté white wine with this ruddy meal.

We ignored the sheets of rain thudding on the roof and listened to rock music.  I taught Florence how to dance to the rhythm of the Rolling Stones, U2 and BB King, and Rai music from France.

We visited Ile-aux-Moines several times and even went to a wedding there.  Laurent filmed the wedding that had lots of strolling musicians playing bagpipes and harps and little girls twirling pixie baskets full of flowers.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting the Modern Art Museum in Brussels (Belgium) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting the Modern Art Museum in Brussels (Belgium) with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

On a quick trip to Brussels (Belgium), my friend Eileen and I planned to visit the Modern Art Museum in downtown Brussels to view their collection of the Belgian Surrealist painter René Magritte.

First, we ate lunch at a restaurant called the Moule Sacré that had good food at a good price.  Mussels are called the “poor man’s oysters,” but I noticed that the Belgians, who ate them had become rather wealthy.  Mussels also taste good especially when made with crème fraîche, shallots, and white wine.

Eileen and I tried a menu special that had the following items on it:

-avocado halves with chopped, boiled shrimp and creamy, estragon dressing

-Scottish smoked salmon with rye bread and salted butter

-Dames Blanches sundaes made with vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce, and whipped cream

After lunch, we went to the Modern Art Museum well fed and eager to view the Surrealist paintings by René Magritte.

I loved Magritte’s painting of a train coming out of a fireplace as well as his painting of a baguette loaf of bread floating in the sky.

After visiting the Museum, Eileen walked me to the Gare du Midi, so I could go back to Paris.

I read a book about Hong Kong all the way home.  I liked being Miss – Information even when I was young.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup of Chopsticks and Marrying France

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