After two nights in Basel, we headed to Strasbourg, France, for one night. Strasbourg is considered the Capital of Christmas, and the whole city takes it very seriously. It would be overwhelming but the city put together a (32 page!) guide that made planning and finding everything pretty easy.
We tried to take a taxi from the station to our hotel, Maison Rouge Strasbourg, but it was right in the middle of the markets. During open hours, there are no cars allowed in the main market area. With a little grumbling and a lot of reminding how lucky we were to be there, we hauled all of our stuff a little over half a mile, on cobblestone and other uneven ground, to our hotel.
It was worth the walk. The hotel was beautiful and so convenient to all the Christmas Market activity.
Pro tip: When planning a Christmas Market trip, pack light!
Luckily our room was ready early so we dumped our stuff and headed out to the market. We grabbed a pretzel, crepes (fromage for me, Nutella for The Husband) and vin chaud.
This Christmas market had two kinds of cups, reusable plastic or traditional ceramic. They both had a deposit, but the plastic one was only €1. You could trade it in, or donate it in boxes around the markets and the deposit would go to charity.
Strasbourg was very big on charity this year. They even had a market that was dedicated to organizations that were devoted to charity. They even had Michelin star chefs selling soups for charity. It was really refreshing and awesome to see.
After eating, we walked around some of the close markets to get our bearings and plan our evening when the lights were on. The best part about Strasbourg (and Basel) is how walkable everything is. The trams were running but everything was so close that we didn’t need to take it.
After walking around a bit, we headed back to the hotel to relax for a bit before going out again. I thought Strasbourg was charming during the day but nighttime blew my mind. The Christmas spirit was everywhere! Businesses, people, the market, everyone was visibly excited for the holidays. You could practically feel the excitement. And you could definitely see the love. The lights everywhere were amazing.
We found the vin chaud with the ceramic cups and drank that while walking around, taking in all the displays. This was my favorite mug of all the markets, because it looks a lot like how Strasbourg looked!
It was really cold (you can tell in this picture!) but it was wonderful. Strasbourg is a really wonderful place and I wish we had longer there. Writing this after going to all the markets, I can say that Strasbourg was my favorite. It was so well designed and beautiful. Despite there being a ton of people, the markets were easy to navigate and the lines were very manageable. The walkways were wide and the markets were spread out enough, but still close together, to make it easy to browse all the stands.
To make it feel even more like Christmas, the next morning we woke to a light dusting of snow!
If I had to choose only one Christmas market to go to, it would be Strasbourg. And I would love to go back in the summer and see what the city is like when it’s warm.
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