One morning in March, I

decided to walk from Mary's apartment to the Rhine, to

check out Cologne's zoo, botanical garden and sculpture

park.

Then, I thought, I'd take

the Strassenbahn to the middle of the city to shop. But

once I began walking, in spite of a cold breeze and

partly cloudy skies, I hated the thought of descending

beneath the earth to catch a train, and opted to walk

just a few blocks further. The Zoobr�cke, where it

crosses the river in Cologne's northern suburbs, frames

the unmistakable profile of the central city, with its

triple-arched railroad bridge, Romanesque churches, the

filigreed glass and iron roof of the train station, and

the cathedral looming over it all.

I passed marker 690, which

indicates the number of navigable kilometers from Basel,

the uppermost major port on the mighty Rhine. I shared

the promenade with strolling families, cyclists, skaters,

even a fisherman or two.

That last is noteworthy.

Bank-fishing is not the passion in Europe that it is in

the American South, so I was surprised to see fishermen

with rods propped and lines tugged by the current. I'm

happy to report that international environmental efforts

have cleaned up the once-toxic Rhine to such an extent

that fish taken from it may now be eaten, and the water

itself is now considered "almost swimmable" at

Cologne.

My attention was riveted by

the river and the ship traffic it bore. This is not the

romantic, castle-lined Rhine, but a brawny working

torrent. The passing vessels included gigantic commercial

barges, oil tankers, container ships with as many as 100

tractor-trailer-sized boxes stacked four or five deep on

double-wide barges.

Much of the freight,

however, is carried by family-owned rigs. The tug (better

called a pusher) is large enough to accommodate the

owner's home, often with traditional white lace curtains

and flower boxes at the windows, always with one,

sometimes two, cars on the roof. I saw one go by with a

tiny playground on the top of the barge itself. My

binoculars revealed a sliding board and swing surrounded

securely on a nice day.

K�ln-D�sseldorf Line tour

boats lined the banks nearer the center of the city,

monsters able to carry hundreds of evening diners or

conventioneers on cruises of the river. Tours didn't

begin until April 1 or I'd have been out there

But back to my stroll.

Approaching downtown Cologne, bright beds of flowers

appear, packed with primroses in vibrant colors. The

architecture of the city ranges from medieval to

strikingly modern, often in the same building. Spiral

stairs give pedestrians access to the bridges crossing

the river to the right bank's mammoth convention arenas.

I stop to admire a huge

bird - a veritable pterodactyl - made of odds

and ends of twisted metal, his wings hinged so the wind

lifts them gently. And I study for some time a simple,

traditional tower where the water's depth is measured and

reported electronically up and down the stream.

Indicators hint at the height the river has occasionally

reached.

When last I overflew the

Rhine, heading home in 1996, it was swollen beyond

recognition, spreading through city streets and parks.

Started the day with an

insufficient breakfast - I'm hungry. There ahead: a

fellow with a pushcart full of thick, soft pretzels.

Between his sparse English and my sparser German, I

determine that the ones in the middle are cheese-filled,

and I'm ready to ignore cholesterol counts and order one

- when the vender's cell phone rings. He excuses

himself, and chats with great animation for awhile,

apologizing when he hangs up.

Cell phones -

"handis," Germans call them - are

everywhere. Everywhere! I'm sure more people have them

than don't. I saw a man trying to conduct a conversation

on the street near the cathedral while the evening bells

were reverberating through the cobble streets -

impossible! People use them on trains, in shops, in

museums, the library, to such an extent that, just before

curtain time at the opera, a phone may be heard ringing

over the PA system, followed by a lady's gentle voice

reminding patrons to turn off their handis.

Food never tastes better

than outside in a river breeze, and I continue my walk,

invigorated. I stop under Hohenzollernbr�cke, the

mammoth arched iron railroad bridge now six tracks wide,

originally built by Kaiser Wilhelm to run directly toward

the cathedral in the heart of the city. The roar of

trains passing overhead, the clatter of wheels over rails

- the noise is palpable.

A few steps farther, and

the view to the right is almost as spectacular as that of

the river to the left. Wide stairs beckon a walker toward

the cathedral, its Gothic magnificence contrasting with

the ultramodern vertical arches of the Roman Germanic

Museum and Symphony Hall below it. I cross the river by

the railroad bridge and walk through the landscaped

grounds of the K�lnMesse, the mammoth trade fair center

with a past.

Originally built in 1928,

the Messe was turned into an outpost of Buchenwald in

1942 and became the point from which Cologne's Jews were

deported to the east.

The park lands on the

gently sloping right bank coaxed me back almost to my

starting point. Never did stop and catch a train that

March day - there was always something else toward

which I wanted to walk, enchanted by a river.

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