Lauenburg is where the Elbe stops being a big river and starts being a working waterway with serious ambitions. The town stretches along a steep bank, with the old town clinging to the hill and the lower town, the Elbstrasse, running along the water's edge, and the river below is wide, brown and busy with barges. For centuries this was a toll town, collecting dues from the traffic that moved between Hamburg and the Baltic, and the Elbe-Lübeck canal begins nearby, which once carried salt from Lüneburg to the sea.
It was the capital of a small duchy, and Bismarck took the title Duke of Lauenburg when he was dismissed from office in 1890, a piece of local trivia that the town has not forgotten. Its riverside houses, many of them half-timbered, were long threatened by the Elbe's floods, and the water has left marks on the walls to show the high-water years. The altitude here is a modest twenty metres, so the river feels close, and on a misty morning the barges drift past like ghosts.
The riding is simple and pleasant, mostly on flat roads through farmland, dikes and woods, with easy curves and good surface. The ride from Hamburg here is an easy hour or so, then on to Mecklenburg, where roads become quieter and the lakes begin. Traffic is lighter than around Hamburg, but trucks are common on the main road, so stay alert.
With about twelve thousand people, Lauenburg has a petrol station and shops, and is a sensible place to refuel before heading into the quieter country of Mecklenburg. There are fish restaurants along the river, and a plate of fried herring or a bowl of eel soup, a north German classic, is good value. Ice cream is also a local passion in summer.
Early morning or evening light is best, when the sun picks out the old roofs and the river turns to metal, and spring is nice when the hedges are in bloom.