Transportation

It is hard to believe our wonderful cruise is complete. We really enjoyed the life on board, the friends we made and the ease of travel--unpack once and your hotel and restaurant travel along with you! The Viking folks keep you busy if you take advantage of all the excursions included in the cost of the trip. There seem to be a lot more ships like the Viking Sun on the Rhine than we saw on our first Viking trip, so river cruising must be gaining in popularity for the same reasons we enjoy it. We should have taken more pictures of the ship, our cabin, the wonderful lounge for sitting and watching the little towns and the river traffic, the restaurant--maybe there will be another time!


River transportation was very fine, but getting around Basel is also very good. The trams date back to the days of horse-drawn trams, and, evidently, the rails were never abandoned and destroyed like we did in the US, rather the move was made from horses to electricity, and the tram lines extended and modernized.


Basel proper has a population of 166,000 with a combined area population over 800,000. For this size population the trams cover a wide area with a frequent schedule. We have never waited more than a few minutes at our tram stop, and the electronic board at the stop displays the number of minutes remaining until the tram arrives. Here is the tram map with all the tram routes in color: