You see me rolling
If you haven’t read the first post about Strasbourg, you can find the story here.
So. The day finally came. September 2021.
If you read the first story, you already know — I am not a vacation friend. And while I tend to be indecisive about most things in life, travel brings out a version of me that knows exactly where she wants to go and what she wants to do when she gets there. No committee required.
I also didn’t want my neighbour at the time to find out I was leaving. I just wanted to go. Quietly. Without opinions, without unsolicited advice, without anyone casting the evil eye in my direction.
So I took my suitcase and slipped away down the back path of my student residence like the independent woman I was. Unbothered. Unbothered and slightly sneaky.
I made my way to the bus stop, caught the bus a few minutes later, and after a ten minute ride arrived at Heidelberg Hauptbahnhof. From there, the route was straightforward enough — Heidelberg to Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe to Offenburg, Offenburg to Strasbourg.
DB, however, had other plans.
I still don’t fully understand how they managed to make a three-stop journey feel like a logistical operation, but here we are. We arrived in Karlsruhe without incident. The connection was smooth. Offenburg, though — Offenburg required a sprint.
I ran from the regional train to the SWE train with everything I had. Thank God for my stamina back then. Lord knows it has since disappeared.
Thankfully, some faster and more merciful passengers ahead of me held the doors open. I arrived breathless, panting, slightly humiliated — but on the train. Another thirty minutes standing, but I made it.
Strasbourg, I was coming for you.
We pulled into the station and I made my way to the tram, heading toward the hotel. The Athena Spa Hotel. Four stars.
I had never stayed anywhere with more than two stars before. Walking into that foyer, I felt it immediately — something that could only be described as arriving.
The check-in, however, was less graceful.
Having never navigated a four-star hotel before, my brain quietly short-circuited the moment I reached the reception desk. I attempted to pay for my room immediately upon arrival. Right there. On the spot. The very kind receptionist — bless her — gently informed me that payment typically happens at the end of a stay.
Oops.
I collected what remained of my dignity, took my room key, and made my way up.
The room was at the back of the hotel. The view, let’s say, offered a certain intimacy with the windows of neighbouring rooms — though everyone had curtains and I was truly not interested in anyone else’s evening. What it lacked in panoramic vistas it made up for in quiet, and quiet was exactly what I needed.
I was hungry. So for the first time in my life, I ordered room service. A burger and fries. When the bill arrived I remember thinking it was an obscene amount of money for a burger — which, I later learned, is simply the universal experience of room service everywhere in the world.
I changed into the hotel bathrobe — thankfully provided — and I just… stopped. Chilled. Existed without agenda. I think when people talk about mindfulness, what they mean is exactly that feeling. The particular peace of being somewhere new, alone, with nowhere to be and nobody waiting.
Relexation
After some thoroughly unbothered phone scrolling, I packed my swimming costume and headed downstairs to the pool.
The hotel had one large pool that alternated between regular swimming pool and whirlpool. When I arrived, a mother and her small son were already there — the boy delighting in the water, the mother doing her best to be both present and slightly invisible simultaneously. She shot me a look. I shot her one back. We understood each other perfectly.
She was from Switzerland — Geneva or Zurich, I can’t quite remember now, though I’ve since visited Zurich and Geneva remains on the list.
And then I swam. I jumped. I smiled. I paused. I enjoyed.
Strasbourg — so far, I like you quite a lot.
I took a photo of the pool on my way out, naturally. As we all know: if you didn’t post it, it never happened.
