2,000 Watch First Lady Take Boat Ride in Historic Strasbourg

Nancy Reagan smiled and waved to an enthusiastic crowd of more than 2,000 who lined up Wednesday to watch her take a 10-minute boat ride through old Strasbourg.

On a day when the American First Lady played tourist while her husband addressed the European Parliament, Mrs. Reagan accepted the invitation of Marguerite Rudloff, wife of the mayor of Strasbourg, to ride down the Ill River and have lunch.

Beginning at the Strasbourg Cathedral, the First Lady cruised past storybook 17th- and 18th-Century mansions, which once housed such people as Voltaire and Rousseau, and the church that Albert Schweitzer attended. She passed under a bridge, whose name translated is Torture Bridge, where convicts were locked in cages and dipped into the water.

Greeted by Bands

At the end of her ride, the First Lady was met by bands, folk dancers and children waving American and French flags, all of them wearing colorful costumes modeled after the clothes worn in the region until the end of the 19th Century.

In addition to the people lining the streets, many leaned out of windows to shout friendly greetings and take pictures.

The First Lady had lunch at La Maison des Tanners, a former inn built in 1572. Before lunch, she sat at a second-story window watching the dancing going on below.

Mrs. Reagan lunched with Marie-Odile Pflimlin, wife of the president of the European Parliament, Pierre Pflimlin, and their daughter, Antoinette; Anne-Marie Dumas, wife of French External Relations Minister Roland Dumas; Marie Helene Galbraith, wife of U.S. Ambassador to France Evan G. Galbraith, and the wives of several local dignitaries.