Who hasn't heard of her - the legendary beauty Lorelei, who once sat on the steep rock in the middle-Rhine combing her hair and held passing sailors so spellbound that they missed the dangerous cliffs and the strong current of the Rhine at this location, capsized and finely died. That in the year 1800 written poem 'Lore Lay' by Clemens Brentano and that by Heinrich Heine in 1823 created and later by Friedrich Silcher set to music song "Ich weiß nicht, was soll es bedeuten..." (I don't know what it means...) about Lorelei's tragic story are surely known by everyone.

The nearly vertical steep Lorelei-rock at the right Rhine bank above St. Goarshausen, where according to the famous Rhine legend the virgin sat, rises 132m above the river surface. At this location of the middle-Rhine, the Rhine once during time divided the once connected Schiefergebirge (slate mountains) of Hunsrück and Taunus and turned it into a wild characteristic river landscape.

Below the rock the Rhine squeezes through the narrowest and at the same time deepest place of its riverbed. The narrowness of the valley made it even necessary to lead the train in a 368m long tunnel through the rock.

The Lorelei-rock is known worldwide. Every year hundreds of visitors pour onto the famous plateau to see for themselves the absolute charming view. The impressive echo also contributed to the rock's fame. At the nearby-situated visitor centre one cannot only discover everything about the mythic Lorelei but also lots about geology, flora and fauna of the region.

OUR TIP: If you don't have a tight schedule visit the rock again during the late afternoon or early evening when the visitors throng has ebbed and the seating-accommodations of the pretty designed countryside park invite a tranquil lingering. Because then one can feel the magic of the rugged rock landscape - with a bit of imagination one could almost believe the lovely Lorelei is sitting on the rock...