In matters touristic, German operators can be quite as Blarneyish as any others. Example: for those who cruise the Rhine, one of the landmarks is the Mouse Tower or, in German Mauseturm. One guidebook tells us that Legend has it that: "Archbishop Hatto of Mainz was eaten by mice in the tower as a punishment for causing a number of hungry people to be burned to death." Another version has it that he was hoarding grain in the tower during a period of great shortage; mice smelled the grain, got in and ate not only the grain but his Grace himself. The guides tell you it's all nonsense and the tower's name comes from Maut, meaning toll, for it was a toll-collecting post. But to most people what stays in memory is perhaps the Archbishop and the mice. The dangers of "Legends."
But no whimsy or titillation is needed to make a ship journey down the Rhine other than a most impressive experience; its beauty of various types of landscape, its immaculate and unspoiled townships, its surprising bird life, all help to overshadow completely in memory, some of the most monstrous giants of industry, with its huge potential for pollution. Indeed, though the Baedecker guide to hand tells us that the Rhine is one of the best-monitored rivers in Europe, and informs us that the Netherlands gets some three-quarters of its drinking water from the river, it does admit that some of the inorganic substances used in industry "is lost by sedimentation, presenting an incalculable hazard for the future."
Still, as you take your ease on your ship (nearly 200 passengers), the long miles of woods and little inlets slip by; fishermen sit with their rods planted in the outcropping piers, (one even fly fishing); children frisk in small sandy bays, and the lazy, or the wise, sit in their comfortable chairs on the upper deck and count the swans, the herons, cormorants, wild duck, terns and the odd crow. Indeed, one birdwoman swears that as the ship glided out of Basel in the early hours, she heard the beginning of the dawn chorus . . . nightingales, though most were warblers and lesser kinds.
It was about 800 kilometers from Basel to Amsterdam, but centuries of strife had left remarkably little mark. The great Cathedrals were there: Cologne, Speyer, Mainz and others. So much to see. You would like to do the four-day journey twice - once watching the right bank, once the left. More tomorrow.