Hamburg · Wendland and Elbe Forest Sweep + Harz Edge Overnight from Hamburg

Scenic road chapters

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Lauenburg Elbe gate

   Lauenburg is the gate of the Elbe, the last town in Schleswig-Holstein before the river runs on into Lower Saxony and Hamburg, and it clings to a steep bank above the water in a way that gives its old town an unusual shape. The main street, the Elbstraße, runs along the shore below the cliff, lined with old half-timbered houses, and the upper town sits on the ridge above, linked by steps and winding lanes. A castle tower still rises over the roofs.

   Read the complete Lauenburg Elbe gate write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Lauenburg Elbe is where the day begins. Next is Hitzacker river balcony.

2. 2. Hitzacker river balcony

   Hitzacker is a small town on an island in the Elbe, and it looks like a model of itself. The old centre is a tight cluster of half-timbered houses with carved beams and painted panels, grouped around a church and a handful of narrow streets, surrounded on all sides by water and meadow. The town sits in the Wendland, the far north-eastern corner of Lower Saxony, a region of quiet villages, forests and wide river plains.

   Read the complete Hitzacker river balcony write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Hitzacker river balcony comes up about 61 km into the recorded legs. Next is Dannenberg food town.

3. 3. Dannenberg food town

   Dannenberg sits on the Jeetzel, a slow, brown little river that wanders through the Wendland, the odd bulge of Lower Saxony that pokes east across the Elbe almost to Brandenburg. For years the East German border ran a few kilometres away, and the region still has the faintly forgotten feel of a place that was a dead end. Riders from Hamburg tend to find that rather pleasant. The traffic is thin, the villages are low and tidy, and nobody is in a hurry.

   Read the complete Dannenberg food town write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   A break here. Next is Göhrde forest sweep.

4. 4. Göhrde forest sweep

   The Göhrde is one of the biggest continuous woods in northern Lower Saxony, a patch of oak, beech and pine that stretches for kilometres between Lüneburg, Dahlenburg and Dannenberg. Ride into it from any direction and the temperature drops by a couple of degrees, the light turns green, and the noise of the open country just stops. After the flat, windy farmland of the Elbe plain it feels like a different country.

   Read the complete Göhrde forest sweep write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Göhrde forest sweep, early in the day. Next is Back to Lauenburg.

5. 5. Back to Lauenburg

   Lauenburg is where the Elbe stops being a big river and starts being a working waterway with serious ambitions. The town stretches along a steep bank, with the old town clinging to the hill and the lower town, the Elbstrasse, running along the water's edge, and the river below is wide, brown and busy with barges. For centuries this was a toll town, collecting dues from the traffic that moved between Hamburg and the Baltic, and the Elbe-Lübeck canal begins nearby, which once carried salt from Lüneburg to the sea.

   Read the complete Lauenburg fuel gate write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Finish at Back to Lauenburg. That is the ride. Next is Hamburg south.

6. 6. Hamburg south gate

   Harburg was its own town for most of its history, and some residents still say so. Standing on the south bank of the Elbe, across the great river from Hamburg, it grew up as a Hanoverian and later Prussian harbour town, with its own castle, canal and industries, until the Greater Hamburg Act of 1937 swallowed it into the city. The old inner harbour has been reborn as a district of offices and cafes, and the technical university stands on a former industrial site. It is a rougher, more honest part of Hamburg than the lakeside villas of the north.

   Read the complete Hamburg south gate write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   The day opens at Hamburg south. Next is Lüneburg.

7. 7. Lüneburg fuel gate

   Lüneburg got rich on salt, and you can still see that in the brick. For centuries brine from under the town was boiled into the white salt that was shipped to Lübeck and used to preserve the herring of the Baltic, and the money from this trade paid for the Gothic town hall, the gabled merchant houses and the old crane by the Ilmenau. The Hanseatic League was good to Lüneburg. The streets are lined with stepped brick gables, many of them leaning a little because of subsidence from the salt mines below, which gives the whole old town a gently drunken look.

   Read the complete Lüneburg fuel gate write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Fill up here — 394 km left and no pump marked after this. Next is Wernigerode overnight edge.

8. 8. Wernigerode overnight edge

   Wernigerode calls itself the colourful town of the Harz, and it is no exaggeration. The old centre is a jumble of half-timbered houses in reds, greens and ochres, with carved beams and crooked upper floors, and the town hall at its heart looks like something from an illustrated book, with two pointed towers and a steep gable. It lies at the northern edge of the Harz, with a hilltop castle looking down from the slope and the high plateau of the Brocken in the distance.

   Read the complete Wernigerode overnight edge write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Somewhere to get off the bike, about 489 km into the recorded legs. Next is Sankt Andreasberg bends.

9. 9. Sankt Andreasberg bends

   Sankt Andreasberg is a small town of two thousand at roughly six hundred metres in the Upper Harz, a mining place that has lived on silver, in one way or another, for five hundred years. The lodes were worked from the sixteenth century, and the Grube Samson, a mine here, is famous for its water-driven ore hoist, which kept working until the 1900s and is preserved as a museum, an astonishing piece of engineering from the age of waterwheels. You can still see the old ditches and ponds that fed the mines across the hills, many of them now loved by walkers.

   Read the complete Sankt Andreasberg bends write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Sankt Andreasberg bends sits at 630 km, late in the day. Next is Torfhaus Harz high point.

10. 10. Torfhaus Harz high point

    Torfhaus is a scattering of buildings on the high road across the Harz, at about eight hundred metres, where the road crosses a wide, boggy plateau of moor and spruce. There is no village here to speak of, just a car park, a few places to eat and the visitor centre of the Harz National Park, and its popularity comes from a view: from the edge of the plateau you look east across a broad valley to the Brocken, 1,141 metres high and bare on top, the highest peak of the Harz. Altenau, six and a half kilometres away, and Bad Harzburg, nine, are the nearest towns for fuel.

    Read the complete Torfhaus Harz high point write-up.

    Recorded stop-planning note

    May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

    Planning note

    Torfhaus Harz high point tops the climb. Next is Goslar high-road.

11. 11. Goslar high-road entry

    Goslar is a thousand years old and looks every year of it. The old imperial city lies at the northern foot of the Harz, and its centre is a miniature of medieval Germany: steep slate roofs, half-timbered houses, narrow lanes, and a market square with a golden glockenspiel that, at set hours, acts out scenes from the town's mining history.

    Read the complete Goslar high-road entry write-up.

    Recorded stop-planning note

    May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

    Planning note

    about 558 km into the recorded legs you reach Goslar high-road. Next is Back to Hamburg.

12. 12. Back to Hamburg

    Harburg, on the south bank of the Elbe, is the part of Hamburg that visitors rarely see. It was a separate town until 1937, and it still has its own centre, its own inner harbour with old warehouses, and a slightly rough, working feel that contrasts with the polished facades of the city across the river. Behind it lies Seevetal, a green commuter district at the northern edge of the Lüneburg Heath, and the land begins to open into woods and sand. The dot sits at this seam between city and country.

    Read the complete Hamburg write-up.

    Recorded stop-planning note

    May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

    Planning note

    The route ends here after 866 km.