Forêt de la Robertsau

This guide to the Foret de la Robertsau in Strasbourg follows four centuries of a working forest along the Rhine, logged by named foresters since the 1500s. You'll hear how the wild, unembanked river reshaped the ground under their feet year after year, and how logging only intensified from the late 1800s as Strasbourg's building boom demanded more timber. Then, in the late 1960s, a new dike along the Canal d'Alsace tamed the floods for the first time in centuries. Within two decades, the cutting stopped entirely, leaving the trees around you unlogged ever since.