Here is the one place on the Wine Route where Germany argued about its own future. In May 1832, some thirty thousand people walked up to the ruined Hambach Castle above Neustadt, waving black, red and gold flags and demanding freedom of the press, national unity and constitutional government. The Hambacher Fest was the first great political rally in German history, and the castle is still called the cradle of German democracy. The colours on the flags are the ones on the modern national flag. The castle is a stiff climb above the town and looks out across the whole Rhine plain, which on a clear day stretches to the Odenwald and beyond.
Neustadt itself is a big, handsome town of more than fifty thousand, with half-timbered houses, a collegiate church shared by two denominations for generations, and a market square that is busiest at the time of the German Wine Harvest Festival each October, when the town crowns a wine queen and a good many people stop counting their glasses. Wine here is Riesling first, with Silvaner and Scheurebe pushing in from the side, and a handful of grand estates have their cellars in the old town.
The riding is the real draw. The B39 and the minor roads that run along the foot of the Haardt, the eastern escarpment of the Palatinate Forest, thread through one wine village after another, a few kilometres apart, each with a church spire, a vintner's yard and a sign promising wine by the glass. The road is flat and gentle, so the pleasure is not in the bends but in the pace and the views, with the forested slope on one side and the plain on the other. If you want more corners, take a side road west into the forest, where the surface is generally good and the bends tighten between pines and old sandstone quarries.
Neustadt is large enough to have fuel on the edge of town, plenty of food and places to leave a bike overnight. A glass of Federweisser, the young half-fermented wine sold in early autumn, goes well with onion tart. Be careful with it, because it tastes like juice and does not behave like juice.
Spring mornings, with blossom on the hillside, are the most gentle time to be here.