The City of Basel offers a wide range of historic, cultural, and contemporary experiences for world travelers. It contains many world-class museums and art galleries, some of Europe’s finest historic structures, and many amusements.

The Port of Basel offers many parks and recreational areas for enjoying leisure time. Visitors can spend many hours strolling the parks, greenbelt areas, rivers, and rural areas. One can visit the Black Forest, enjoy a picnic beside the Birs, visit the Botanical Gardens, or tour the zoo.

Tour boats and passenger ships offer year-round excursions on the Rhine in the Port of Basel. Visitors can also take land-based tours of the city’s fantastic architecture, both contemporary and historic.

The Port of Basel is well-known as a wonderland of culinary adventures. Sitting on the borders of Switzerland, Germany, and France, it has abundant bistros and gourmet restaurants where diners can enjoy a taste for every pocket.

The 1000-year-old Cathedral of Basel, known as Munster by residents, is the city’s outstanding landmark. Its sandstone walls, twin towers, and multi-colored roof tiles embrace a choir, crypt, two cloisters, and the tomb of Erasmus of Rotterdam. The Cathedral is open daily through the summer for tours.

The Port of Basel’s Basler Pfalz, on a terrace behind the Cathedral, was home to the Bishop of Basel before the Protestant Reformation. Stairs take you from the Pfalz to the landing stage for the Cathedral Ferry. A narrow gate takes you from the terrace to the cloister of the Cathedral where you’ll find the decorated gravestones of Basel’s leading families from the 16th to 19th Centuries.

The Tinguely Fountain stands today where once stood the Town Theater. In 1977, Jean Tinguely constructed amusing sculptures in a huge pool of water. The fountain is very popular and has become a modern symbol of the city.

Visitors will not want to miss Basel’s Old Town when they arrive at the Port of Basel. It has been preserved with devotion to the city’s rich history, and many 15th Century buildings now stand with modern architectural structures.

The Port of Basel is home to the world-famous “Hammering Man,” a sculpture by J. Borofsky of a 13.5-meter-tall man that has been swinging his hammer since 1989. The 8-ton sculpture is the artist’s expression of hope for all who work together to make this planet’s environment safe and healthy for all.

The Basel Art Museum (Kunstmuseum Basel) holds the oldest public art collection in the world. Highlighting collections of works by famous artists of the 19th and 20th Centuries, visitors will enjoy works by Witz, Grunewald, Cranach the Elder, Bocklin, Cezanne, van Gogh, and Gaugin, among many others.

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