Neumünster is a town of seventy-eight thousand, the biggest between Hamburg and Kiel, and it earns its keep as a place where roads, railways and fortunes cross. It grew rich on cloth, and for much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries its mills and tanneries made it one of the great textile and leather towns of northern Germany. A museum of cloth and technology tells that story, and the old industrial buildings still stand in the quarters near the river.
It is not a pretty town, and does not pretend to be, but it is honest. The centre is built of brick and concrete, with a pedestrian zone, a covered market and the usual high-street shops, and the people are friendly in the dry, no-nonsense way of the north. Neumünster also has a lake on its edge, the Einfelder See, where families come at the weekend to swim, walk and sail, and a few green corners among the housing estates.
For a rider, it is a practical finish, and a useful one. The roads in from the west, from the Schlei and the Angeln countryside, pass through flat farmland and woods, with the odd bend and a lot of straight, and the final miles are on busy roads that lead through suburbs and shopping centres. Traffic can be thick at rush hour, with the nearby motorways feeding in lorries and commuters, so give yourself time and keep your lane discipline.
Fuel is not an issue, since the town has stations all around its ring roads, and bakeries, cafés and supermarkets on every main street. Padenstedt and Bönebüttel, smaller villages near the town, offer quieter places for a stop, though they have little to offer beyond the basics. If you have time to spare, park near the central square and take a short walk. After the water and wide horizons of the north, the town feels solid, and welcome.