Lydie went out early to the bakers and returned with two baguettes: one white, the other dark. She also purchased a sweet bread typical of the area, Hugel Loaf. In good company, we breakfasted on tea, bread, local creamy butter, and Lydie’s homemade preserves.
While Lydie prepared a traditional sauerkraut meal (oven-baked pork shoulder and sauerkraut, separately boiled potatoes and sausage, served with white wine and mustard), Henri took us to the Ebersmunster Abbey. The two exterior towers flanking the entrance are square at the bottom and then flare out like onion bulbs. At first glance, it reminded me of minarets, but Henri said there was no Muslim influence.
Walking into the L’Eglise Abbatiale, I gasped at the beauty of the combined stone, wood, and stucco. This abbey church is the only example in France of the Austrian baroque art, an artistic movement marked by rich ornamentation. Rose-colored stone floors, alabaster walls, and doors and windows painted in light-blue trimming create a light and welcoming atmosphere. Over the main rose marble altar is a canopy choir and above that a crown of gold surrounding a fresco of the Apocalypse Lamb and the Holy Trinity. Light-blue columns separated the main altar from the two side ones. Other ceiling frescoes (including the assumption of Mary and the martyrdom of St. Maurice) painted in the subtle gold, blue, rose, and white hues draw the eyes upward and add to the overall richness of the church’s ornamentation.
The Silberman Organ installed in 1732 maintains its original condition.
Leaving the abbey, we rode along the Rhine and saw a ferry that takes cars and passengers to Germany and back for free. Henri then showed us the tea house and gardens where he buys his teas.
After lunch the four of us went to Mont Ste Odile, a peak in the Vosques Mountains. We parked below the abbey and walked up about a mile (2 km). Lydie told us that this was a sacred Celtic place and that she is sensitive to the meridians of energy on the mountain. There was a legends exhibit along the path, and statues and ornament made the walk interesting.
From the top, we could see the Alsace valley with the Black Forest in the distance. On the other side are the Vosques Mountains. In the convent’s chapel, volunteers pray twenty-four-seven for world peace. Lydie is scheduled to participate in this vigil in January.
Ste. Odile was the blind daughter of a 7th century king, who disowned her. In the Chapel of Tears (one of two chapels on the terrace), it is said that her tears created a crevice in the mountaintop, seeping down the mountain and mixing with the waters, where many blind people have supposedly received sight from the curative waters. In the Chapel of Angels, a mosaic displaces Mont St. Michel and Mont Ste. Odile and the WWII liberation.
According to Wikipedia, between August 2000 and May 2002 more than 1,000 ancient books went missing from the monastery library. A book collector stole the books after finding an old map showing a secret entrance into the library. The route was not easy, however, involving climbing up exterior walls, a steep staircase and a secret chamber. A mechanism then opened the back of one of five cupboards. The disappearance of so many books over such a length of time confused the librarian, the monks and the police, with Gosse finally being caught by closed-circuit television cameras.
Mont Ste. Odile is part of the Camino in France. From here, Santiago is 1423 miles (2291 km) away.
On our way back, we visited Obernai, the second most visited city in Alsace, after Strasbourg. We are grateful to our hosts, Henri and Lydie, for showing us this area. Without them, we would not have seen any of these sites.