Plon is a small town on a tongue of land between two lakes, and the biggest of them, the Grosser Ploner See, is the largest lake in Schleswig-Holstein, a broad, shining sheet of water dotted with islands and fringed with beech woods and reeds. The ride begins at the lakeside, a few minutes from the old town, with the pale Baroque castle on its hill above the water, and that sense of space and light sets the tone for the day. About thirteen thousand people live in Plon itself, with Ascheberg, a village on the lake's western shore, a short way off.
The landscape here is called the Holsteinische Schweiz, Holstein Switzerland, a name that makes locals smile and visitors raise an eyebrow, since the highest point is little more than a hill. But the glacial landscape of lakes, hummocks and valleys is lovely, and it makes good motorcycle country for people who like gentle, rolling roads instead of mountains. The lanes wind between fields and woods, through villages with brick churches and thatched barns, with a surface that is mostly good and bends that flow. The route toward Malente, Bungsberg and Eutin gathers pace through the hills, and at 168 metres, Bungsberg is the highest point in the state, where you can top it with a flourish. Traffic is light outside summer weekends, when cyclists, sailors and day trippers fill the roads.
The castle in Plon was built in the seventeenth century for the dukes of Holstein-Plon, and it later served as a military academy and is now a boarding school. The town itself began as a Slavic fortress on an island in the lake, and it later became a trading centre of the region, with a small, pretty centre of brick houses and a harbour. Eutin, farther east, was the birthplace of the composer Carl Maria von Weber, and its castle and rose gardens are worth a stop.
The lakes are a haven for birds, with cranes, grebes and white-tailed eagles nesting around the shores, and in autumn migrating geese fill the sky. Beech forest covers the hills, and in May the rapeseed fields glow yellow. The air smells of water, cut grass and, sometimes, a smoked fish stand by the quay, where eel and herring are sold.
Fuel is easy to find in Plon and the larger villages, and the cafes by the lake serve excellent cake. Bring a light waterproof, since the weather in northern Germany changes quickly, and take your time.