The day began in Basel with a city walk in the rain. Here is the town hall with a small market in the square.

From there we walked up the hill to the impressive Münster, built of red sandstone with a patterned roof in the thirteenth century and rebuilt following an earthquake in 1356.

The tower of St George, on the left of the main frontage, has some white stonework dating from the original church (consecrated in 1019), as well as a thirteenth-century statue of the saint impaling a dragon.

The interior of the Münster. This is the altar area.

This is in honor of the great Dutch humanist, Erasmus, who is buried here. Erasmus, although not a reformer, had great influence on the reformers in that he inspired a study of the classics, in part by writing a new translation of the Bible.

A plaque commemorating Jacob Bernoulli, a famous mathematician.

One of the important but lesser known Reformers is Johannes Oecolampadius He also had an influence on John Calvin while Calvin worked in Basel, writing his Institutes of the Christian Religion.

It cleared up in the afternoon for a great farewell to Basel and the end of our cruise

Our cruise left us with many happy memories: castles, cathedrals, Roman ruins, windmills, half-timbered buildings, and especially the sights of the Rhine and Mosel rivers.

 

Back to the beginning at Antwerp.