Lake Constance

Lake Constance refers to three bodies of water on the Rhine at the northern foot of the Alps: Upper Lake Constance, Lower Lake Constance, and a connecting stretch of the Rhine, called the Lake Rhine. These waterbodies lie within the Lake Constance Basin in the Alpine Foreland through which the Rhine flows.The lake is situated where Germany, Switzerland, and Austria meet. Its shorelines lie in the German states of Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria, the Swiss cantons of St. Gallen, Thurgau, and Schaffhausen, and the Austrian state of Vorarlberg. The actual location of the border is disputed.

The Alpine Rhine forms in its original course the Austro-Swiss border and flows into the lake from the south. The High Rhine flows westbound out of the lake and forms the German-Swiss border as far as to the city of Basel.The most populous towns on the Upper Lake are Constance, Friedrichshafen, Bregenz, Lindau, Überlingen and Kreuzlingen.