Rue de Poissonerie and Rue de Tanneurs, Colmar, France

As I was reviewing our pictures this morning, and marveling at the beauty of this place, I remembered something Jodi and I heard while passing a tour group. This section of town, now called Le Petite Venise, little Venice, has streets named Rue de Poissonerie and Rue de Tanneurs, Street of Fisherman and Street of Tanners. The guide was discussing how the tanners worked with the hides describing the process of soaking the hides in urine. The better off people had a pot to piss in, those less fortunate didn’t hence the saying, “piss poor”. Don’t know if that’s true or not. Makes a nice story for the tourists though. My thought though, was the god awful stench that must have permeated every facet of life hear. The urine, the tanning process, the fish, the muck, and all of it running into this pretty little canals and streams. Gives the beauty now a great deal of perspective.