I had been wanting to go to European Christmas markets for years. Truly, YEARS. And finally in 2025, due to Dan’s job change, we found ourselves with an extra week of vacation in December and booked a last minute trip to the Alsace during Christmas market season. We visited Strasbourg, Colmar, Basel, and Paris over the course of a week! I will be posting more about this trip, including information about the Colmar market and comparing Colmar and Strasbourg, but this post details exactly what we did over the course of one week. Highly recommend taking an extra week of vacation to Christmas market hop!
A real, live Christkindelsmärik.
DAY 1: WELCOME TO STRASBOURG – THE CAPITAL OF CHRISTMAS
We arrived at Paris Charles de Gaulle after an overnight flight from Newark (NYC). We took the train, which we pre-booked, directly from CDG to Strasbourg, France. We arrived in Strasbourg in the early afternoon, left our luggage at our hotel, Voco Strasbourg City Center (by IHG), and promptly walked to the Place Kléber Christmas market, one of Strasbourg’s eight (!!) Christmas markets. I didn’t originally expect to jump right into the markets without a nap, but it being too early to check in, off to the markets we went.
Welcome to the Christmas Capital – this is Strasbourg’s largest Christmas tree in Place Kléber.