Glashütten takes its name from the glass huts that worked in these forests in the Middle Ages, when the endless beech and oak of the high Taunus supplied fuel for the furnaces and potash for the glass. Today it is a quiet village spread over a saddle below the Großer Feldberg, at around 880 metres the highest summit in the Taunus, and the Roman frontier passes right by it. Watchtower 3/42 stood on this stretch of the Limes, where the bank and ditch run through the forest along the ridge; near the Feldberg summit, the remains of a small Roman fort, the Feldbergkastell, show where a garrison guarded a pass through the mountains.
The Feldberg is the Frankfurt region's mountain. On a clear day you look south across the Rhine-Main plain to the towers of Frankfurt, the Odenwald and, in exceptional conditions, the hills of the Palatinate. The summit has a transmitter tower, a viewing platform, a restaurant and a crowd of walkers, cyclists, families and riders on weekends; in winter, it is one of the few places near Frankfurt where you can sledge.
The roads around the Feldberg are known to every rider in the region, which is both the attraction and the problem. They are steep, twisty and scenic, but they have a long history of accidents and noise complaints, and parts of them now carry speed limits, overtaking bans and, at times, weekend restrictions for motorcycles, as well as regular police checks. Ride them on a weekday morning with respect for the limits and they are a pleasure; on a sunny Sunday, the crowds and controls can spoil the fun. Watch for cyclists climbing slowly, deer in the forest and damp, leaf-covered corners in autumn.
Glashütten has basic shops; for fuel and a bigger choice, Königstein im Taunus, six kilometres away, is the obvious stop. It is a charming small town dominated by the ruins of a huge castle, blown up by French troops in 1796, with cafes and restaurants on its pedestrian streets. Schmitten, on the other side of the Feldberg, is a village with a few inns. The Taunus is cooler than the plain, often by several degrees, which makes it a welcome escape on hot summer days, but fog can roll in quickly, especially in autumn.