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...on a ride down the Rhine
Gongoozling
A gongoozler is 'an idle spectator, esp. one who stares for a long time at something', first attested in 1904, according to one source. 'Gongoozler' was originally, and still is, someone who ogles boats on inland waterways. That rock of knowledge Wikipedia has some more unreferenced ramblings at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gongoozler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gongoozler
The Rhine
The navigable Rhine from Constanz in Switzerland to Hoek van Holland is 1033km long (but I'm only planning to ride 883 of those, or about 551 miles, from Basel). The name 'Rhine' is based on the Proto-Indo-European root 'reie-' meaning 'to move, flow, run'. (says Wikipedia). As the river approaches the Netherlands, 81,000 cubic feet of water is moving, flowing or running down it every second. The Rhine was considered by the Romans to be the final frontier of civilisation and reason, beyond which lay only the barbaric. That primal wilderness is now known as 'Germany', land of music, science, philosophy and the Bratwurst sausage. Since the Romans, the French and the Germans have many times tried pointlessly to nick bits of each other's land on either side of the river. The allies' decision to take the Rhineland out of Germany at the end of the First World War humiliated the German people and thus became instrumental in Hitler's rise to power. And all that time, the river ran...
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