Alsace Wine Route

Route description

Start in Strasbourg, with its pink sandstone cathedral and the half-timbered canal quarter of Petite France. Check the Crit’Air sticker rules for the city’s low-emission zone before driving in. The Alsace Wine Route then runs south along the foot of the Vosges, first reaching Obernai, a lively town with a market square, ramparts and vineyard walks.

Follow the vineyard roads south past Barr and Dambach-la-Ville to Orschwiller, where a winding road climbs to Haut-Kœnigsbourg. This red sandstone castle, rebuilt by Kaiser Wilhelm II, has views across the Alsace plain to the Black Forest; the car parks along the access road fill up on summer afternoons.

Riquewihr is a walled wine village of half-timbered houses and courtyards, best seen early before the day visitors arrive. Continue to Colmar, where the canal-side houses of Little Venice and the Unterlinden Museum with its Isenheim Altarpiece are the highlights, then end in Eguisheim, whose lanes run in concentric rings around the castle. Look out for storks nesting on roofs and church towers.

The route is good from spring to autumn, busiest at the September and October harvest, and again in December for the Christmas markets. Most villages have car parks at the edge, often with motorhome areas, as their centres are narrow and partly pedestrian. Wine tasting is part of the trip, so plan who drives.