Parc de la Citadelle

This guide to Parc de la Citadelle in Strasbourg starts with children chasing a football over ground that the military engineer Vauban fortified in 1681 to guard the Rhine bridge. It follows the walled garrison town he built, complete with bakery, chapel and powder houses, through nearly two centuries of quiet duty and into the Prussian bombardment of 1870 that reduced much of it to rubble. Look for the escarp wall, two bastions and a hidden escape gate still built into today's moats and playground, and picture the swans gliding where soldiers once stood guard.