Abenteuer Dreizehn: Die Rheinfalls

The Rheinfalls is the largest waterfall in Europe. It's located in a quaint little medieval town called Schaffenhausen, which can be reached conveniently via an inner-city train from Zürich.

The train ride to Schaffhausen is beautiful.

 Unfortunately, Schaffenhausen lies almost directly on the German border. Because of this, my cellular device decided to send me a lovely "Welcome to Germany" message--which had me worrying for the duration of my convenient train ride that I had accidentally hitched a ride to a different country.

When I got to Schaffenhausen, however, and noticed the incongruously high prices of literally everything, I was happily reassured that I hadn't left Switzerland.

Schaffenhausen is a beautiful little medieval village, filled with helpful, kind people who were ecstatic to meet someone from as far away as Bern, let alone the United States.

Had I had more time, I would have loved to stay and explore the town. As it was, however, I was on a mission. A mission to find the waterfall.

Why was this so important to me?

Because it happened to be Saint Patrick's day, and on Saint Patrick's day, they light up the waterfall green. 

After stopping for directions from the woman who ran the grocery store, Gary and I were on our way. Our journey led us several miles along the banks of the river Rhein.

These flowers grow like weeds here. They're one of the prettiest thing in Europe, in my opinion.

Gary enjoyed the view

He also enjoyed swimming in the Rhein

On the way, the current picked up, the water grew louder, and rocky islands cropped up in the river's midst.

When we reached the head of the falls, we crossed a tiny pedestrian train bridge to reach a castle that overlooks the water.

Looking down wasn't a good idea:

Reaching the castle on the other side was cool, though. I spent a few minutes exploring the courtyard.

Then I made my way down to the waterfall.

Next to the big waterfall, there was a tiny one which powered a paddle-wheel:

At the bottom, both waterfalls met to form a small outlet, like a lake:

The tower is a very nice bar and restaurant. You know, the kind a college student can't afford to breathe next to. 

Having reached the bottom of the Rheinfalls, I now had to wait for approximately an hour and a half alone in the cold an progressive darkness for the falls to be lit. I kept waiting for a crowd to form; weirdly, none did.

Finally, when all had gone dark, a single ship with two green lights sailed out into the harbor. That was the signal. Gradually, one by one, green spotlights lit along the waterfall's banks. An emerald glow slowly seeped out across the water. It was stunning.

Unfortunately, as my camera works very poorly at night, my photographs make it look like a special effect from Ghost Busters.

Hey, hey Gatsby...hey about that green light...

If you'd like to see a good picture of what it actually looked like, or if you'd like to learn more about why they light up the Rheinfalls, please check out the official webpage here (it's auf Deutsch, but the picture is good).

As for me, I just consider myself lucky to  have seen the largest waterfall in Europe (and to have survived the walk back through the dark in one piece).