Friday, May 28, 2010

Annecy

On our way to Geneva on Thursday to visit relatives, Susie and I took a little time to stroll through the old section of Annecy, capital of the Haute-Savoie department. Annecy is a gracious resort city and France's proposed host city for the 2018 Winter Olympics. The medieval part of Annecy was built around the castle of the Dukes of Savoie, whose descendant Victor Emmanuel II eventually united and ruled over Italy, at the cost of ceding Savoie (and Nice) to France.

Some of the medieval streets, in concentric circles around the base of the chateau, have massive arcades.

Water flows through medieval Annecy in multiple channels of the Thiou Canal, so this area is called "Little Venice."

The buildings along the canal are picturesque, and perhaps self-consciously so.

The various channels of the canal are so pervasive and complex that one of them actually flows right under the city's cathedral.

As a resort city, Annecy has all the attractions a visitor could want, including artisanal ice-cream shops. If you ever wanted to know what a smurf tastes like, here's your chance. One of these flavors is "Schtroumpf," which is what smurfs are called in France.

Where the canal meets the Lac d'Annecy, boats lie ready to give rides to visitors.

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