Lusatia Lakes and Tagebau Views

A 518 km loop

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Why this ride

A proper escape from Berlin motorcycle escapes with roads worth waking up for. Out of Spreenhagen and back again: 518 km, roughly 10 h 48 in the saddle. On the way it passes near Letschin, near Chorin, Scenic stretch near Gransee and Breddin. It crosses from Germany into Poland - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. The line favours views over speed.

Roadbook

1. Fuel stop in Spreenhagen fuel

   Spreenhagen is a scattered rural municipality south-east of Berlin, where the River Spree winds through forests and meadows between Fürstenwalde and the capital. The villages here are small and quiet, with old churches, farmhouses and modern homes for commuters, and the landscape is a typical Brandenburg mix of pine forests, wet meadows and lakes.

   The Spree is the river of Berlin, flowing through the heart of the city, but here it is a quieter stream, meandering through a broad valley with alder woods and reeds. The forests around Spreenhagen are part of a large wooded area that stretches south towards the Dahme lakes and east towards the Scharmützelsee, and they are where deer, boar and many birds. In summer, the lakes are popular for swimming and boating, and the air smells of pine and warm sand.

   The roads are mostly flat, running dead straight through pine forest and only bending where a lake or a village gets in the way. Traffic is light, apart from the main roads near the motorway, which can be busy with commuters and trucks. The A12 motorway to Frankfurt an der Oder and Poland runs nearby, providing a fast route east or back to Berlin. Watch for wildlife, especially at dawn and dusk, and for sand on the road at forest edges.

   Fuel and supplies are most reliably found in Fürstenwalde, the nearest larger town, a few minutes away. Fürstenwalde has a cathedral and a pleasant centre on the Spree. Spreenhagen itself works well for a rest in the forest before heading south towards the Lusatian lakes, where former opencast mines have been flooded to create a new landscape.

2. Food stop near Letschin food

   Frederick the Great stands on a pedestal in Letschin, and the people of the Oderbruch have good reason to remember him. In the mid-eighteenth century, the Prussian king ordered the draining of this vast marshy floodplain of the Oder, a huge engineering project that created new farmland and villages for thousands of settlers. He is said to have declared that he had conquered a province in peace. The landscape today is a flat, fertile plain of fields, ditches and dykes, stretching to the Polish border.

   The Oderbruch has a dramatic modern history too. In April 1945, the Soviet army launched its final offensive on Berlin from the bridgeheads across the Oder, and the battle of the Seelow Heights, on the ridge at the western edge of the plain, was one of the bloodiest of the war. A memorial and museum at Seelow tell the story, and the landscape still bears traces of the fighting.

   The riding here is flat and open, with long straight roads across the fields and big skies overhead. The views are wide, and the light is beautiful in the evening. The roads can be windy, and agricultural traffic is common, especially at harvest time. Some roads are lined with trees, and the villages may have cobbled streets. The Oder dyke offers a fine ride along the river, with views into Poland.

   The nearest dependable fuel and food are in Seelow or the larger villages along the main roads; Letschin is a place to look, not to shop. A local inn may offer hearty Brandenburg dishes, such as potatoes with quark and linseed oil. The Lusatian lakes lie far to the south, a long ride along the eastern edge of the country.

3. High point near Chorin swim

   Chorin Abbey rises out of the trees like a red brick cathedral that someone forgot to finish. Cistercian monks founded it in the thirteenth century as part of the German settlement of Brandenburg, and its towering west front is one of the finest examples of north German brick Gothic. After the Reformation it fell into ruin, and the Prussian architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel was among those who campaigned to save it in the nineteenth century. Today it hosts a well-known summer concert season and has a gentle, almost romantic air.

   The surroundings are part of the Schorfheide-Chorin biosphere reserve, one of the largest protected areas in Germany. The landscape here was formed by the last glaciation: moraine hills, kettle lakes, beech forests and peat bogs. It is unusually hilly by Brandenburg standards, so the roads actually rise and fall, curving between lakes and through cathedral-like stands of beech. Cranes, sea eagles and beavers live here, and in autumn the sound of migrating geese fills the sky.

   The riding is relaxed rather than demanding. Many minor roads are avenues lined with old trees, beautiful but unforgiving if you run wide, and some village streets are still paved with cobbles that get slick in rain. Agricultural traffic and cyclists share the roads. A few kilometres east, at Niederfinow, the ship lifts raise barges up the edge of the Oder valley; the old 1930s steel structure and the new lift beside it are an engineering spectacle worth a short detour.

   Chorin itself is a small village, so for fuel head into Eberswalde, the nearest proper town, which also has supermarkets and bakeries. Near the abbey there are cafés catering to visitors, especially on weekends and concert days. Park, walk under the brick arches, and enjoy one of the quietest corners within an hour of Berlin.

4. Scenic stretch near Gransee swim

   Gransee is one of the best-kept medieval towns in Brandenburg, still enclosed by almost the full ring of its brick walls, with gate towers and defensive turrets. In the middle stands the great brick Gothic church of St Mary, and on the market square a curious cast-iron monument designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel marks the spot where the coffin of Queen Louise of Prussia rested overnight in 1810 on its way to Berlin. Louise was hugely popular, and her early death caused national mourning.

   The countryside around Gransee is typical of northern Brandenburg: gently rolling farmland, pine and oak forests, and countless lakes left by the glaciers of the last Ice Age. To the north lie the Stechlin and Ruppin lake districts, beloved of the writer Theodor Fontane, who described the region in his famous travel writings. The lakes are clear and quiet, perfect for a summer swim.

   The riding here is relaxed. Roads run through forests and fields, often lined with avenues of old trees, which are beautiful but leave no room for error. Some villages still have cobblestone streets. Traffic is light, apart from the B96 main road, which runs north from Berlin towards the Baltic coast and can be busy, especially in summer. Wildlife is abundant, so watch for deer and wild boar, particularly at dawn and dusk.

   Gransee has fuel stations, supermarkets and a few cafés and restaurants. It is a good place for a break: walk around the walls, visit the church and the Louise monument, and enjoy the calm of a small town that has kept its character. Next, the road continues towards the Lusatian lakes, a very different landscape shaped by mining.

5. Near Breddin, on the way back swim

   In August 1896, on a hill called the Gollenberg near the village of Stölln, a few kilometres south-east of the point, Otto Lilienthal lost control of his glider, fell about fifteen metres, and died of his injuries the next day. He had made hundreds of flights from these slopes, and his experiments laid the groundwork for the Wright brothers. Nearly a century later, in 1989, an Interflug Ilyushin airliner was landed on the grassy meadow at the foot of the same hill as a tribute, and it is still there, a strange and wonderful sight in the open countryside, now a small museum.

   All around is the Rhinluch, a flat, open landscape of wet meadows, drainage ditches and small villages between Breddin, Rhinow and Dreetz, in the north-west of Brandenburg. It is a land of big skies, storks and cranes, where the horizon seems endless and the wind blows freely. In autumn, thousands of cranes gather on the fields, filling the air with their calls.

   For a swim on the way back, the area has lakes and slow rivers, and the Havel and its side lakes lie to the south. Not every stretch of water is suitable: some lakes are bird reserves where swimming is not allowed, and others have muddy, reedy shores, so look for the local bathing spots, marked with signs and often with a small beach or jetty. The water is soft and often a little brown from the peat, and in summer it warms up nicely.

   The roads in the Rhinluch are flat, quiet and often straight, lined with old trees, with cobbled sections in some villages and the occasional tractor. Watch out for crosswinds on the open stretches. Breddin and the surrounding villages are small, with limited services, so fuel is best found in larger towns like Kyritz, Neustadt or Wusterhausen. On the way back to Berlin, the roads through the Havelland are pleasant and easy, with little traffic.

6. Photo stop near Golzow swim

   South of Brandenburg an der Havel the land breaks into a quiet patchwork of pine forest, heath, small lakes and farm villages, the transition between the Havel lowlands and the Fläming hills. Golzow is one of those villages, a cluster of farmhouses and a church where you will rarely see more than a few cars. It is the sort of place where you stop because it is peaceful rather than because of any particular attraction.

   This country was shaped by glaciers. The ice sheets of the last cold period left sand, gravel and lakes, and the result is a landscape of sandy soils, dry pine forests and wet hollows. The forests smell of resin on warm days, and in late summer heather blooms on open areas, some of which were military training grounds during the Cold War. Lakes in the area offer clear water for a swim on hot days, and the shores are often lined with reeds and alders.

   History is never far away. Not far north is Lehnin, with a Cistercian monastery founded in the twelfth century, one of the oldest in the region and an important site in the early history of Brandenburg. To the south, the town of Bad Belzig has a medieval castle and a thermal spa. The roads between them are quiet and pleasant, with gentle curves and long straights through forests, but some are narrow, lined with trees, or paved with old cobbles.

   Golzow itself has no real services, so plan fuel and food in Brandenburg an der Havel, Lehnin or Bad Belzig. A picnic by one of the lakes is a good alternative. From here, routes lead south-east towards the Lusatian lakes, where former opencast mines have been flooded to create a new landscape of water and sand.

7. Near Buch finish

   Buch, on the far northern edge of Berlin, is a district shaped by medicine. In the early twentieth century, the city architect Ludwig Hoffmann built a series of large hospital complexes here, in a park-like setting outside the crowded city, and Buch has been a centre of hospitals and medical research ever since. Today it is home to the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine and a cluster of biotech companies, as well as a large hospital campus, and the old Hoffmann buildings, with their red-brick and stone façades, are still impressive.

   Around the institutes, Buch has a surprisingly rural feel, with forests, fields and lakes stretching north into Brandenburg. The Bucher Forst is a large wooded area crossed by walking and cycling paths, and the Karower Teiche, a series of ponds, are a nature reserve, home to many birds. The Panke, a small river, flows south from here through the city to the Spree. In the old village centre, a Baroque church stands next to the park of a castle that was demolished in the 1960s.

   As a finish point for rides back from Lusatia, with its lakes formed from old open-cast mines and its strange, scarred landscapes, Buch offers a quiet end to the day. The ride back into Berlin from the south and east involves crossing the city or using the motorway ring, and weekday evenings are the slowest time to try it. Once in the northern suburbs, the roads become quieter, lined with trees and houses.

   There are fuel stations and supermarkets in Buch and the neighbouring districts, and a few restaurants and cafés. The Barnim plateau to the north, with its forests and lakes, is a pleasant area for short rides, with quiet roads and cobbled villages. Berlin's weather is continental, with warm summers and cold winters, and the north-east of the city often feels a little breezier and cooler than the centre.

8. Back to Lusatia Lakes finish

   Here the forest begins to close in on Berlin. Grünheide, a village of about seven and a half thousand, sits between the Peetzsee and the Werlsee, and its streets run among tall pines. It has become better known in recent years because the electric car maker Tesla opened a large factory in the forest on the edge of town in 2022.

   The label points to Lusatia, the lake district about a hundred kilometres to the south-east, where huge open-cast lignite mines, Tagebau in German, are being turned into lakes. The ride there shows an extraordinary landscape of raw cuts in the earth, giant excavators and new water, a place that is changing before your eyes. Back here, the contrast is soft, with sandy soil, birch and pine, and the smell of resin on a warm day.

   Riding in this region is simple and pleasant. Roads run straight through the woods, with long avenues of old trees and a surface that is mostly good, though sand can drift across the lane in places. Cobbles still appear in villages. In dry summers, forest fire danger is high, and signs at the roadside show the daily level. Deer and wild boar cross at dawn and dusk, so slow down. Cyclists and walkers use the lakeshore paths in good numbers.

   Spreenhagen has fuel and a few shops, and Grünheide has a couple of cafes and a petrol station, with larger services in Erkner, a short ride west. The lakes are popular for swimming, and the best way to end a hot day is a plunge in the Peetzsee. Spring and autumn are the best seasons, with cooler air and fewer crowds.

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