The Wetterau is the broad, fertile plain north of Frankfurt, between the Taunus and the Vogelsberg, and the Romans considered it so valuable that they bent their frontier around it to include it in the empire. The Limes ran along the northern edge of the plain, and the watchtowers numbered WP 4/53 to 4/57, near the town of Lich, stood on this section, part of the Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes listed by UNESCO in 2005. Like most watchtowers, they survive only as mounds or traces in the fields and forest, but the line of the frontier can be followed on foot or by bicycle.
The countryside around Lich has much to offer. A few kilometres south of the town, the ruins of Arnsburg Abbey, a Cistercian monastery founded in the twelfth century, stand in a peaceful setting by the river Wetter, with a Gothic church open to the sky and a monastic garden. To the south-west, the castle of Münzenberg, with its two tall towers, rises on a hill above the plain; locals call it the Wetterauer Tintenfass, the inkwell of the Wetterau, for its shape. Lich itself is a small, charming town with half-timbered houses and a brewery whose beer is known across Hesse.
For riders, the real attraction lies to the east, in the Vogelsberg, a vast extinct volcano, the largest volcanic massif in Central Europe, now a rolling upland of forests, pastures and small villages. The roads up into the Vogelsberg are winding and scenic, with good surfaces and light traffic. Near Schotten, the Schottenring, a public road circuit, hosted motorcycle races in the 1920s and 1950s, including world championship events, and riders still come to ride its curves, though it is an ordinary road today with traffic and speed limits.
The Hoherodskopf, near the summit of the Vogelsberg, has a car park, a restaurant and views over the surrounding countryside, and it is a popular meeting point for riders on weekends. In winter, snow can cover the higher roads, and fog is common in autumn.
Lich, a town of over thirteen thousand people about three kilometres away, has fuel, shops and restaurants; Münzenberg and Hungen are smaller. Try a plate of Ahle Wurst, a dried sausage typical of northern Hesse, or a Schmandkuchen, a sour cream cake, with a glass of local beer. And take a walk through the ruins of Arnsburg in the evening, when the light falls through the empty windows of the church.