Hochwald is a ridge of woods, which is a surprising thing to find in the flat country of the Lower Rhine. The ground here was pushed up by the glaciers of the Ice Age, which shoved sand and gravel into long, low ridges known as push moraines, and the woods that cover the ridge near Uedem have been left in peace for generations. Beech and oak form a canopy over the old lanes, and in autumn the leaf litter is deep and the air smells of mushrooms. For a rider used to the endless flatness of the Niederrhein, even a modest hill feels like an event.
The Roman connection is a quiet one. The Lower German Limes ran along the Rhine to the west, and the high ground near Uedem and Xanten was of strategic interest, since a ridge gives a view, and sites of this kind often turn up traces of camps and watchposts under the forest floor. Nothing is on show, and you should not expect signs or ruins, but there is a pleasure in knowing that sentries once stood where you are riding.
The towns nearby are curious. Kalkar, a short way north, has a beautifully preserved market square, a gothic church full of carved wooden altars made by medieval workshops, and, outside the town, the shell of a nuclear power station that was finished in the 1980s but never switched on, and has been turned into an amusement park, with a swing carousel in the cooling tower. Uedem is a small place, and its airbase nearby hosts a NATO control centre, which brings the odd military vehicle on the road.
The riding is relaxed. Narrow roads wind through the woods and fields, with some gentle bends and long straights, and the surface is generally good. Cyclists and farm vehicles are common, and the roads around the forest can be damp and slick with leaves in the autumn. Spring is lovely when the woods fill with bluebells and wild garlic, and summer is warm with plenty of shade.
Fuel is easy at Kalkar, a town of about fourteen thousand, and at Uedem, with some eight thousand, and both have shops and cafes. The ride list heads west across the Dutch border to Tiel, in the river country of the Betuwe.