Swimming in the Rhine

Yesterday, Robert had a surprise in store for us after dinner - we were going to swim in the Rhine! It is very common to see people in the water during summer - there are public areas right next to the water some have stone beaches and there is even a nude beach not far away. People of every age and walk of life congregate to enjoy the cool water on a hot day. It's a 15 minute walk to the river from our apartment - so off we went to see what it was all about. Here's what you do: put your towel and your clothes in a waterproof bag, you wade into the water with your bag and your shoes because there are hazardous rocks below (but the river gets very deep quickly), a fast moving current sweeps you up and you can float on your bag or swim with the current, when you're ready to get out - navigate over to the river's edge and use stone stairs to exit the river. Then you just take out your towel, dry off and put your clothes back on. We did it twice and will definely do it again. There are three main bridges downtown and we passed under two of them - some people even jump off the middle bridge into the water! We weren't able to get photos of our swim, but here is a site that has a great picture (middle bridge pictured). You can see our other pictures of Basel events here.