Traveling Along the Rhine River
Europe’s Premier Waterway in Switzerland, France, Germany, Holland
The Rhine River is Europe's premier waterway flowing from Switzerland through France, Germany, and the Netherlands before ending in the North Sea.
The Rhine River is Europe’s most important and arguably most famous waterway. The Rhine is 1,320 kilometer (820 miles) long from its source in Switzerland to the North Sea in the Netherlands. It is an important commercial waterway but also very popular with tourists enjoying cruises, sightseeing, or more active pursuits.
- The Rhine is Rhein in German, Rhin in French, and Rijn in Dutch.
The High Rhine in Switzerland
The Rhine in Switzerland is often referred to as the High Rhine (Hochrhein), especially for the section between Lake Constance and Basel. The source of the Rhine is in the Swiss Alps with the two initial main tributaries known as the Vorderrhein (Anterior Rhine) and Hinterrhein (Posterior Rhine).
From the south of Switzerland, the Rhine flows northwards to the Bodensee (Lake Constance). On the way, the Rhine forms the border between Switzerland and Liechtenstein and Switzerland and Austria shortly before reaching Germany’s largest lake. From the lake it mostly, but not continuously, forms the Swiss-German border.
The Upper Rhine in France and Germany
The Rhine is navigable from the Swiss border town Basel all the way to the North Sea and often very busy with commercial traffic. From Basel past Strasbourg to near Karlsruhe, the Rhine River forms the border between France and Germany.
Other historically important cities on this section of the Rhine include Speyer, Worms, and Mainz. All three were important during the Middle Ages and have interesting Romanesque cathedrals.
The UNESCO World Heritage Listed Middle Rhine in Germany
The Middle Rhine from Rüdesheim and Bingen to Koblenz is on the UNESCO World Heritage list. This romantic short section of the valley is what made the Rhine legendary.
The Middle Rhine valley is steep and statistically a castle can be seen every two kilometers. The valley is at its steepest and the Rhine at its narrowest at the treacherous Loreley Rock where according to legend a singing mermaid, rather than the rapids, drew captains to their deaths.
The Rhine is a 450 m (1,480 ft) wide, slow-flowing stream at Mainz. However, at the Loreley Rock the Rhine narrows to 130 m (420 ft) and flows at a rapid 10 km/h (6 mph).
The Lower Rhine in Germany and the Netherlands
North of Koblenz the valley is much wider and nature less spectacular although the Siebengebirge with the Drachenfels (Dragon Rock) near Bonn are notable exceptions. The main attractions from here northwards are cities. Cologne (Köln) is the largest city on the Rhine and its famous Gothic cathedral and several Romanesque churches provide a distinct panorama.
Modern Düsseldorf gives the first indications of what the rest of the river will look like. Next is the heavily populated Ruhr region – for centuries the heart of German heavy industry and mining. The Rhine continues to provide a relatively cheap method of transportation and the commercial traffic from here to the Netherlands can be very heavy. Duisburg is the largest inland port in Europe.
The Rhine enters the Netherlands shortly after Emmerich. At this stage, the Rhine’s average discharge is 2,260 cubic meter (79,823 cubic ft) per second. From here, the largest body of water flows down the Waal River while the Lower Rhine (Nederrijn) is a much smaller river. The water finally reaches the Atlantic but by this stage the rivers are not called Rhine anymore. (A few streams still have Rijn in their names but no actual water from the present Rhine River. The Rhine’s flow through its delta in the Netherlands changed drastically since Roman times.)
- Riverside activities are enjoyed along the full length of the Rhine but the UNESCO World Heritage listed Middle Rhine is particularly popular with day-trippers enjoying day cruises on riverboats, hiking, cycling, and sightseeing in small picturesque villages and romantic knights’ castles. Multiple-day cruises on the navigable Rhine and Rhine tributaries such as the Mosel and Main are increasingly popular with a number of riverboat cruise lines operating on the river for most of the year.
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