Dausenau is the village that leans, or at least its church tower does. The tower of St Kastor, in the Lahn valley just a couple of kilometres from this watchtower site, tilts noticeably, giving the half-timbered lanes below it a slightly drunken air that tourists enjoy. The tower stands beside a gate of the old town wall, and the village is a pretty, slightly sleepy place where the Lahn bends through steep wooded slopes. The Roman tower number on the label belongs to the Limes that ran up and over the hills above the valley, and the site lies on the heights rather than in the village itself.
Getting here is half the fun. The Lahn valley road between Nassau and Bad Ems is a ribbon of smooth bends hugging the river, with the railway squeezed in beside it and vine-like woodland climbing the slopes. Climb out of the valley by the side roads and you meet steeper, more twisty tarmac with a couple of hairpins, where the trees close in and the surface gets patchy with leaf litter in autumn. Take it gently on wet days and watch for cyclists on the Lahn cycle path, which draws plenty of traffic on summer weekends.
Bad Ems is only a short way down the river, with almost ten thousand people and every service you might need, from fuel to a good cafe. Dausenau itself has a couple of village eateries and a bakery, but do not count on late opening hours. The Roman frontier here is quiet and unmarked in the main, and the walk up through the beeches to the tower site is more satisfying than the site itself, since the woods have a deep stillness and good birdsong in spring.
If you want one image to carry away, make it the crooked church tower catching the last light at the end of the day, with the river dark below and the hills fading into blue. It is an old, human sort of place, and the Romans were only the first of many to pass through.