Last weekend, Joe and I visited Freinsheim along with Rainer and Heidi and some of their good friends. Freinsheim is a picturesque little town surrounded by vineyards and orchards just off the Deutsche Weinstrasse, and this was the weekend of their annual Culinary Wine Stroll (Kulinarische Weinwanderung), a chance to ramble among the rows of grapevines, eat more food than is good for anyone, and sample dozens of wines. It was also a chance to listen to live music. One large band was playing “Papa was a Rolling Stone.” I did NOT imagine that I would come to a German wine festival and hear the Temptations. But it sounded great.
The festival was packed with visitors, all out enjoying the beautiful weather. The children in our party had a great time on this fairground swingset. This is one of those things that German children get to enjoy but our children don’t because those things are solid wood and very, very heavy. We’d run wild, get in the way of a swing, suffer brain damage, and sue for a million bucks.
This unusual monument is a visual pun on the name of the vineyard in which it stands, which produces Freinsheimer Oschelskopf wine. (“Kopf” means head.) Apparently, it hasn’t been universally admired because the sculptor chiseled a sprightly little verse onto the back that reads, “If you’d been here earlier, I would have taken your advice on this, but as it is, keep your mouth shut.”
Later, we sat in a beer garden at an old wooden school desk and ate Flammkuchen (Alsatian pizza). The desk looked to me like it came from the 1800’s, but two of our party announced that they had studied at just such a desk. The waiter brought us our Flammkuchen, but only because he said we had been good little students that evening.
Photos taken in September, 2011, near Freinsheim, Germany. Text and photos copyright 2011 by Clare B. Dunkle.