Welcome aboard the Eel Fishing Museum!

What’s that by the water? A museum! From a distance, it may look like an ordinary boat sitting quietly among the docks, but it is packed with stories, history, and adventures to explore, experience, and discover. The Eel Fishing Museum is not a traditional museum building. Instead, the museum itself is a historic Aalschokker that now sits on dry land. More precisely, it is the Fiat Voluntas, a restored working and living vessel like those used by eel fishing families along the Rhine until not all that long ago. Can you go inside? Absolutely! Even if the door looks closed on windy days, the exhibition on board is open daily from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Below deck, you can explore everyday life aboard an Aalschokker and discover the history of fishing on the Rhine. Peek inside a cooking pot, take a look into the cabin, and browse through a living manuscript. How did people live aboard the boat? How did they fish? And what is this boat doing on an album cover by the punk rock band Die Toten Hosen?

Take a walk around the boat, too. At our interactive displays, you can explore the shape of an Aalschokker by touch, listen to adventure stories told by a real fisherman, open panels to discover texts and photos, and peek inside a smoking cabinet.