Things to do
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Basel Rathaus
The red town hall on the market square, begun in 1504, with a painted courtyard and a gilded tower added in 1900. The cantonal parliament still sits in it and the courtyard is open to walk into.
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Rhine Ferries
Four small ferries crossing the Rhine on cables, driven by the current alone with no engine, running since 1854. The crossing takes about three minutes and it is the cheapest boat trip in Switzerland.
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Basel Minster
A red sandstone church on a terrace above the Rhine, Romanesque and Gothic, holding the tomb of Erasmus, who taught here. The Pfalz terrace behind it looks over the river and both towers can be climbed.
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Fondation Beyeler
A Renzo Piano gallery of 1997 in a park at Riehen on the city's edge, built for the collection of a local dealer, with Monet's water lilies hung against a glass wall onto a lily pond. It is the most visited art museum in the country.
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Grand Hotel Les Trois Rois
One of the oldest hotels in Europe, on the Rhine since 1681, with a terrace over the water and a guest list running from Napoleon to Picasso. It was rebuilt in 1844 and restored in 2006.
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Kunstmuseum Basel
The oldest public art collection in the world, municipal since 1661, with the largest holding of Holbein anywhere and a line through Boecklin, Cezanne, Picasso and Rothko. The city bought two Picassos by referendum in 1967 and he gave it four more.
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Museum Tinguely
A Mario Botta building on the riverbank holding the machines of Jean Tinguely, which are kinetic sculptures made of scrap that visitors switch on themselves. They are loud and they break, which is the point of them.