Sankt Goarshausen, Germany: the Loreley town in the heart of the Rhine Gorge

At the narrowest and deepest point of the Rhine, where the river squeezes between steep slate cliffs, a rock rises some 130 metres above the water: the Loreley. Legend, given its enduring form by Clemens Brentano and Heinrich Heine, tells of a golden-haired maiden who sat here singing and lured boatmen to wreck on the reefs below. At the foot of that rock lies Sankt Goarshausen, a small wine town of around 1,250 people on the eastern bank in Rhineland-Palatinate, about 30 kilometres south of Koblenz and roughly 90 kilometres west of Frankfurt, at the centre of the UNESCO-listed Upper Middle Rhine Valley.

Above the town perch two castles with feline and rodent nicknames: Burg Katz, "Castle Cat", built around 1371 by the toll-collecting Counts of Katzenelnbogen, and the older Burg Maus, "Castle Mouse", a little upriver. Across the water rise the ruins of Rheinfels above the twin town of Sankt Goar.

Tolls, salmon and town walls

Sankt Goarshausen received its town rights in 1324 from King Ludwig the Bavarian, and two medieval towers and stretches of its wall still stand. For centuries the Counts of Katzenelnbogen grew rich here on Rhine tolls and salmon fishing, commanding the dangerous bend of the river from their hilltop strongholds.

Rock, river and fire

Today the Loreley plateau above the town has a visitors' centre, an open-air amphitheatre and dizzying views down the gorge, reached on foot by the Rheinsteig trail or from the riverside. Each September the "Rhine in Flames" fireworks light the cliffs and castles, and paddle steamers still call at the quay, carrying travellers through one of Europe's most storied river landscapes.