Rhine water levels 2023 and similar topics

[TMLAalum]

@ksloanbrown

Welcome to Cruise Critic! Your 1st post is especially appreciated since we follow you on the Avalon Expression in 24 days! 

Please start a new thread about your cruise on the Expression! Any tips, insights and your overall impressions will be greatly appreciated! Thanks!!

[notamermaid]

5 hours ago, Canal archive said:

A bridge over the Kennet &Avon Canal in Bath has on its arch when travelling west the head of Sabrina goddess of the river Severn

Sabrina - Severn, I see how it has evolved in the letters. Thank you, I do not know much about the rivers of England. Surprised that the Severn is longer than the Thames. The view from the bridge over the Severn estuary is stunning. More word history - the Mosel is the Latin Mosella which means small (river) Maas (Meuse).

 

Father Rhine and Mother Moselle allegories are depicted on this monument in Koblenz in the park along the Rhine embankment:

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datei:Vater_Rhein_und_Mutter_Mosel.jpg

 

"Vater Rhein und seine Töchter" is the title of a monument in Düsseldorf: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vater_Rhein_und_seine_Töchter

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

Kaub gauge at 206cm. Quite a bit of water still coming from the Upper Rhine valley. Weather forecast to improve.

 

Plenty of room, i.e. a good level, for high temperatures and lack of rain to have no real impact and the figures above 100cm for some time.

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

Bombs in Rüdesheim

 

Four WWII bombs in Rüdesheim need to be defused so all traffic has been halted including on the river. https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/rheinland-pfalz/mainz/vier-weltkriegsbomben-bei-ruedesheim-am-rhein-gefunden-100.html

 

This map is a bit clearer, you can see that it is downstream from Rüdesheim:

https://www.hessenschau.de/panorama/verkehr-gesperrt-entschaerfung-von-weltkriegsbomben-bei-ruedesheim-laeuft-v8,weltkriegsbomben-niederwalddenkmal-100.html

 

It is estimated that the emergency situation will last till midnight.

 

notamermaid

 

[Kristelle]

They found bombs still active from 80 years ago??

 

Wow, that's an unusual reason for a hold up in your trip - nuisance at the time but make good story when you get home 🙂

[notamermaid]

1 hour ago, Kristelle said:

They found bombs still active from 80 years ago??

Regularly. The fuse can very often still work and make the bomb explode when moved. All four were "easy" apparently in the end and were defused on site. Life has returned to normal. Stopping river traffic is unusual of course. Happened once last year that I know of (somewhere else on the Rhine). May have missed one other report. I think it was also once on the Moselle. If not last year then in a previous year.

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

Apparently, The Bingen/Rüdesheim area was heavily bombed. It was strategically important as there were railways and a bridge. Question: "Bridge, what bridge?" Answer: "That one": https://www.romantischer-rhein.de/en/a-ruin-of-hindenburg-bridge

A stump in the river is still visible from a river cruise ship as you sail past. It was the sister bridge to the ones at Urmitz/Engers and Remagen/Erpel (yup, that famous one). Only the Urmitz/Engers bridge was rebuilt.

 

There are fascinating (and sad I may add) photos taken in 1945. It was what was called "Trolley Mission Flights" that provided those images. You can read about this here: https://www.b24.net/trolley-missions-overview.htm

 

Or if you can stomach seeing images of the bridge and many other bombed ruined places search for Trolley Mission Hindenburgbrücke on Google.

 

notamermaid

 

 

[notamermaid]

Kaub gauge looks to have reached the plateau this afternoon. The downward trend may well have started but from now 216cm it is a long way to go to not so favourable water levels. No sign of the figures turning to double digits before 21 August and even then the probability is low.

 

notamermaid

 

[azcruise]

On 8/10/2023 at 7:36 PM, notamermaid said:

Kaub gauge looks to have reached the plateau this afternoon. The downward trend may well have started but from now 216cm it is a long way to go to not so favourable water levels. No sign of the figures turning to double digits before 21 August and even then the probability is low.

 

notamermaid

 

@notamermaid We passed Kaub about an hour ago. It was fun to see it after reading your posts for the past months!

[notamermaid]

As anticipated no huge amounts of rain and volume of water to back up the river's levels, so the slow decline to low levels is happening. Still all fine though, 170cm at Kaub. And looking really pleasant potentially till the end of the month.

 

notamermaid

 

 

[petemc]

We are going from Amsterdam to Basel on Sept.25-Oct.3. Do you think the levels will be ok for this cruise? We will be on the VIKING NJORD. Thanks for all you do!

[notamermaid]

2 hours ago, petemc said:

We are going from Amsterdam to Basel on Sept.25-Oct.3. Do you think the levels will be ok for this cruise? We will be on the VIKING NJORD. Thanks for all you do!

 

Welcome to Cruisecritic. I would be leaning myself out of the window if I gave you a guess. So far into the future I have no idea and the statistics-based probability chart (six weeks) is of little use. We can look two weeks into the future and there the probability for good water levels is high. That is what I indicated above, i.e. we can now almost see the end of the month in a graph.

 

 Have a great cruise.

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

Saturday evening was the main event of "Rhine in Flames", a series of fireworks with entertainment and ship parade.

 

The event organizers were very pleased with how it went and state that 140,000 spectators lined the embankments. Here is a German article with videos, if you feel like translating with a machine (or can read the German): https://www.swr.de/swraktuell/rheinland-pfalz/koblenz/rhein-in-flammen-drei-tage-sommerfest-in-koblenz-100.html

 

In the second video at 2:19 spot the boat the "Viking Orvar" sailing out of Ehrenbreitstein harbour. I have been told that she took a small landing stage downstream (not visible in the video shot) to possibly Andernach or further. She spent the weekend in Brohl harbour according to her signals' log book on marinetraffic.com

 

According to Binnenschifferforum she is a "Schubschlepper". For the real fans of such vessels here is the full entry on that website: https://www.binnenschifferforum.de/showthread.php?97416-Viking-Orvar-SSL-07002118

 

notamermaid

 

[flahagan]

Thanks for all of the updates on water levels.  I just returned last night from the  Gate 1 Monarch Empress Amsterdam to Basel and absolutely no problems with water levels.  Beautiful scenery and loved all of the swans!

 

[Host Jazzbeau]

54 minutes ago, flahagan said:

Thanks for all of the updates on water levels.  I just returned last night from the  Gate 1 Monarch Empress Amsterdam to Basel and absolutely no problems with water levels.  Beautiful scenery and loved all of the swans!

Yes, the swans are so much more elegant than the Canada Geese* that we are infested with.  For some reason they* are protected by the Migratory Bird Act, even though they never migrate...

[Canal archive]

So how did they get to our canal? Interestinggggg

[notamermaid]

8 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

the Canada Geese* that we are infested with

Those geese - tell me about it... Had not been that aware of the growing problem but then I saw a report on television about three years ago how much work it is to get the Koblenz outdoor public swimming pools clean, especially the grass areas surrounding them. I think we refer to our species growing in numbers to "Nilgänse" but I tend to confuse the two, not sure which is which. Have not seen swans for months but then I am not often at river banks where they congregate. It is pigeons, geese, gulls (the smaller varieties) and cormorants, etc. Occasionally I see a heron.

 

Although the Rhine is a straightened, "industrial" and busy waterway there is much wildlife and the river is cleaner than one may think, with all the sewage treatment plants having been working for decades. There are numerous islands and flood plain areas in France and Germany that are nature reserves, as well as part of the "Altrhein", the old river course.

 

notamermaid

 

[Canal archive]

Canal du Nivernais France

 

 

All aboard - look very carefully a superb mummy swan.

[deec]

12 hours ago, Host Jazzbeau said:

Yes, the swans are so much more elegant than the Canada Geese* that we are infested with.  For some reason they* are protected by the Migratory Bird Act, even though they never migrate...

Canada Geese are also very troublesome where we live!!!  They make a huge mess!!  We live in Michigan, Detroit area and the geese are definitely increasing in numbers.  There seems to be no way to keep them off the grass, docks and some swim platforms on the stern of boats.

[Canal archive]

Whilst cruising through Devizes on our narrowboat a few years ago the local swan attacked across the rudder, nearly boarded the boat and DH got a few bruises on his ankles he was a swan nesting near the marina and so was so obnoxious the boaters had nicknamed him Atila the swan. Sad to say he came to a bad end he picked a fight with the next swan along the canal who was a whily old bird and he was fairly young. The older bird actually killed the younger one so sad. I do love seeing the parents carrying the cygnets on their backs.

[notamermaid]

A sad story. Swans are not the smallest of water birds, I can imagine them getting rather protective and vicious as a result. I found a photo in my archive that I quite like, I still remember taking that in 2014 at Neuwied embankment. I do not remember the specific reason for me being there on that day though.

 

 

A white domestic goose. Not the most graceful appearance but then twisting and bending while washing is not the most graceful of movements or positions for many species... There were a few more nearby.

 

The island there is called Weißenthurmer Werth and is a protected area although fishing is allowed. I have seen gulls and cormorants at the island's northern tip.

 

notamermaid

 

 

 

Edited August 15, 2023 by notamermaid

[notamermaid]

The "MS Wissenschaft" is on tour, currently in Mainz. If you want to read about and perhaps see the barge in real life on its last few stops this year, here is the info: https://ms-wissenschaft.de/en/

 

notamermaid

 

[sharkster77]

A local college has a small pond at the center of its campus and was having a problem with geese soiling the surrounding area.  The facilities department purchased a border collie that had been trained to chase geese away.  Newspaper story reported on this, indicating that the solution to the problem was working quite well----and the grounds crew enjoyed having a canine "colleague" hanging out with them!

[Host Jazzbeau]

I have suggested the local golf courses keep a few foxes for the purpose...

[notamermaid]

It is cloudy and rainy in the parts of the Rhine valley but the rain is not substantial enough to get the level at Kaub up. When a higher volume of water comes from way up in the Upper Rhine valley we may see a small rise. After that it is "downhill" but the figures will most likely stop short of 100cm.

 

notamermaid