The Black Forest capitol is a university town with a network of narrow, winding streets lined with restaurants and shops, where fresh, clear water runs in narrow channels

Black Forest metropolis

Though this old Freiburg saying that may be a bit of an exaggeration – "There are two kinds of people in this world; those who live in Freiburg, and those who wish they did" – after a few days in town, you may start to feel that way. At the very least, you won't want to leave.

Quite simply, the city is a joy to visit; relaxed but electric, calm but alive, a small city dressed in smaller-town clothes. It's German but with an almost Mediterranean climate and the ambiance and joie de vivre that goes with it. France, after all, is just 15 miles away. The Austrians, too, left their cultural fingerprint here, thanks to the city's 400 years under Habsburg rule.

Pride is expressed everywhere. The sidewalks are paved with dark pebbles from the Rhine. In front of each shop, quartz and other stones form mosaics of medieval trade symbols: a boot for a shoe store, a mortar and pestle for an apothecary, a bear in front of the Gasthaus Zum Roten Bären, and an ice cream cone with three scoops in front of an ice cream parlor. This is no easy task: Three men are employed full-time and each day can complete only a small area of sidewalk. The shops share the costs.