Neumünster is not a town people ride to, but it is a very good town to ride out of. It lies in the middle of Schleswig-Holstein, where the motorways from Hamburg, Kiel and the north meet, and it has the practical, working feel of a place built by industry. For centuries it was a centre of cloth and leather, and the textile mills lined the little Schwale river, though most of them closed in the twentieth century. The town grew from a monastery, founded in the early twelfth century by the missionary Vicelin, and his name is still borne by the main church.
This is a place for filling tanks and starting days. With more than seventy-eight thousand people, Neumünster has plenty of fuel stations, supermarkets and bakeries open early, and it is easy to find a quick breakfast. There is nothing here you would call romantic, but the practicality is a relief, and it saves you worrying about whether the village ahead has a pump. Riders heading north to the Baltic coast, or the Danish border beyond, often gather here before the long run into the quiet country of Angeln.
The roads leaving town to the north and east are the part worth noting. They quickly turn into small country roads through low, rolling farmland, with Knicks, hedged fields and red-brick villages, and the traffic thins within a few kilometres. The land is gently hilly, a leftover from the ice age, with patches of woodland and some small lakes. The surface is mostly good, and the corners are open and easy, so the first hour of the day is a good chance to warm up the tyres and settle into the rhythm.
Weather in Schleswig-Holstein changes fast, with bright sun, a squall and sun again within an hour, and the wind is a constant companion. Take a waterproof layer. If the day is long, tank up properly before leaving, since the countryside to the north has plenty of villages but fewer petrol stations than you might expect. In the early morning, with mist lying in the hollows and the first light coming across the fields, this plain stretch of Holstein is surprisingly pleasant.