“The trail starts at the end of town. Walk until you reach the vineyards, keep going, and then you will see it,” said the woman at the tourist information office. We weren’t convinced. Earlier, this same person had told us that the trail started at the tourist office itself, which it did not.

Still, we had nothing else to go on, so we made our way through Eguisheim, once voted the most beautiful village in France. The grapes hung heavy on the vine and it was warm in the sun, but we pressed on, walking slowly but steadily uphill.

Finally, a stand of trees. It was the beginning of the park, the forest and a network of trails that, if I understand it correctly, could take us all over the area if we had the stamina to hike them.

We reached a bridge, a decision point. Would we continue up the steep path to the ruins of three castles. Yes, in fact we would. Up, up we climbed, making friends with our fellow hikers, including two beautiful Australian shepherd doggies.

The climb wasn’t as strenuous as we feared, and within an hour we were standing on top of the world — or at least well above the Alsatian plain. The bells of Eguisheim wafted up to us from the village, striking the hour — one, two, three — as we clambered over the ruins of a 11th-century castle: stones that we quarried more than a millennium ago!

It was hard to leave, but we had no desire to spend the night up there. So we made our way slowly down, back to the village and civilization. Three castles, two tired walkers.