Solling Forest and Weser Quiet Roads
A 235 km loop from Hannover south-west
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Why this ride
Deep forest, small towns and patient bends for a full day. 235 km round from Springe - plan on about 4 h 53 of riding. The stops in between: Einbeck, Dassel forest road and Bodenfelde river stop. Uslar Solling entry is the high point. Long stretches are under trees.
Roadbook
- Hannover south-west gate
start
Springe sits at the southern foot of the Deister, a ridge of beech forest that runs across the landscape between Hannover and the Weser hills. It is a town of nearly thirty thousand, with an old centre of half-timbered houses, and it has its own claim to fame: the Saupark, a large walled forest that was once a royal hunting ground for the Hanoverian rulers, still home to wild boar and deer. The wall can be followed for miles, and gives a sense of how seriously the nobility took their hunting.
This starting gate is on the edge of town, with the ridge rising behind it, and the roads that leave here are some of the best in the region. They climb gently through the forest and out onto quiet farmland on the far side, with valleys, small villages and wide views. Wennigsen and Bad Münder, both with their own spa histories and half-timbered cores, are close by. The hills around here are not high, but they are well wooded, and the roads wind in ways that make the day feel longer.
Weather matters more than you might think. The Deister catches the rain, and low cloud can hang over the ridge for days in autumn and winter, while the summer brings the occasional thunderstorm. Spring and early summer are lovely, with fresh green beech leaves and clear air, and the autumn colour is gold and rust. The forest roads can be damp and covered in leaves, so take it easy on the corners.
Fuel is no problem in Springe, with stations on the main roads and several supermarkets, and the larger town of Bad Münder am Deister has more. This is a good place to start the day with a coffee and a fresh roll, because the next stop may be a long way off. The ride goes on to the Weser, and then through the Solling, a vast forested upland, so make sure everything is ready before you go. A short walk around the town centre is a pleasant way to warm up.
- Einbeck fuel gate
fuel
If you drink bock beer, you owe Einbeck a toast. In the Middle Ages this small Hanseatic town became rich on exporting its strong, dark beer, which was carried by wagon all the way to Munich, where brewers later copied it. In the Bavarian accent the name Einbeck turned into Oanbock and then simply Bock, which is how a town in Lower Saxony ended up giving its name to one of the great beer styles. The town still brews, and the smell of malt sometimes drifts through the streets.
The old centre is one of the best preserved half-timbered towns in the north. A great fire in the sixteenth century destroyed most of the earlier buildings, and the rebuilt streets show off carved beams, painted panels and the sort of sturdy gables that only a rich burgher class could pay for. The market square is lined with fine houses, with a tall church tower above, and you can spend a pleasant hour just walking around and reading the inscriptions on the old timbers.
For a rider, Einbeck is a practical gate between the Leine valley and the hills of the Solling and Harz edge. It has almost twenty-eight thousand people, with fuel stations on the ring roads, supermarkets and no shortage of places to eat. Parking a bike near the centre is easy, but the old streets have cobbles that are slick when wet, so walk the last bit. If you want to eat something local, look for dishes with beer in the sauce, or sausage and potatoes with a glass of the local brew, within sensible limits for a person who still has to ride.
The roads around Einbeck are mostly quiet and agricultural, running over low hills with long views of fields and woods, then climbing gently into forest toward Dassel and the Solling. Traffic is light apart from commuters near the town. Weather comes from the west and can change quickly, so it is worth watching the sky. Late summer, when the grain is gold and the light low, makes this country look its best.
- Dassel forest road
scenic
Dassel is a small town on the western edge of the Solling, the broad wooded upland that fills the space between the Leine and the Weser. Its name is not much known outside the region, but one of its sons altered the map of Christian Europe. Rainald von Dassel, born into a local noble family, became archbishop of Cologne in the twelfth century and, in 1164, brought the relics of the Three Kings from Milan to Cologne, which is why Cologne's enormous cathedral exists in the form it does. Pilgrims came in their thousands, and the money paid for the cathedral. A statue of Rainald stands in the town, and the town is proud of the link.
The forest road itself is the real attraction. It leaves Dassel and climbs into the Solling through spruce and beech, a country of long, smooth, rolling hills with few villages. The surface is generally good, and the bends are wide and gentle, so you can ride at an even rhythm and look at the trees. In the morning the mist often sits in the low parts of the forest, and the sun comes through the trunks in slanting columns. It is a quiet, almost meditative bit of riding, with deer sometimes standing at the edge of the road at dawn or dusk.
Be a little careful in autumn, when leaves and wet needles make the surface slick on shaded corners, and in winter, when the higher stretches can hold ice well after the valley has thawed. Forestry trucks use some of these roads, particularly where timber is being removed after storms and beetle damage, and they leave mud on the tarmac.
Dassel has just over eleven thousand people in its municipal area, enough for a petrol station, supermarkets and a few bakeries and cafés, though not much more, so Einbeck, to the east, is the more sensible place for a full meal and fuel. Fill the tank before you commit to the Solling roads, because the forest has few services and villages are small. A bottle of water and a light jacket are the only extras you need.
- Uslar Solling entry
pass
Uslar is where the Solling begins to feel like real country. The town sits at the western foot of that big, rounded upland, on the little Ahle stream not far from the Weser, and it has the unhurried look of a place that serves the farms and forests around it. The old centre has a handful of timbered houses, a church and a modest square, and that is about the extent of its showing off. Behind it, the forest rises in dark folds.
The Solling is an old, worn-down plateau of red sandstone, which gives the soil a rusty colour in ploughed fields and quarry cuts, and the sandstone has been quarried for centuries. Weser Renaissance buildings along the river use it for window frames and steps, and you will notice the warm red tone in villages as you ride through. The plateau is mostly beech and spruce, with wide clearings, and it forms part of a nature park that takes in both the Solling and the Vogler. Moorland and small streams run in the high part, and this is a place where black storks are said to nest and where red deer make their autumn noise.
The road up from Uslar is a proper climb by northern German standards, though not anything an Alpine rider would notice. It winds through woods in long, easy bends, with a steady gradient and good visibility, and the sun flickers through the branches. The surface is mostly sound. Because the plateau is high enough to catch weather, mist can drop in quickly and the temperature falls, so a spare layer is sensible even in late spring. In autumn the beeches go gold and copper, and the whole slope seems lit from within.
Uslar has about sixteen thousand people in its municipality, so fuel stations, supermarkets and a few bakeries and inns are available, and it is the sensible last place to stock up before the forest. Inside the Solling the villages are small and the services thin. Bodenfelde, down in the Weser valley, is the other nearby option. If you want to eat, local game dishes and sausage appear on inn menus in autumn, and the portions are generous enough to need a rest afterward.
- Bodenfelde river stop
swim
Bodenfelde is a small town on the Weser at the southern tip of Lower Saxony, where the river is still young, having been born a little way south at Hann. Münden from the meeting of the Werra and the Fulda. From here it flows north through the Weser Uplands, between the Solling on the west bank and the wooded slopes on the east, and the valley is one of the quieter and prettier river landscapes in the region.
The river is the reason to stop. A path along the bank gives you a view of the water, which is broad, olive-green and slow, and on a warm day you may see canoes drifting past and families sitting on the grass. Swimming in the Weser is something locals do in places where the current is gentle and the bank is easy, but it is a working river and has barges and unpredictable currents, so ask before you do it, and do not leave your boots on the bank unattended. Most riders will be content with a sit and a look.
The riding along the valley is easy and soothing. The road follows the river, passes through farm villages with big timbered houses and orchards, and rises now and then over a low spur on gentle bends. Surfaces are good, the traffic is thin outside weekends, and there is rarely a reason to hurry. A short way upstream lies Bad Karlshafen, a tiny planned town laid out in the early eighteenth century for Huguenot refugees, with white baroque houses around a harbour basin. It is an unlikely thing to find on the edge of Hesse, and worth a detour of a few kilometres.
Services in Bodenfelde itself are modest, a bakery or two, a shop and perhaps an inn, so do not count on a long list. The nearest larger town is Uslar, about six kilometres away, and it has a proper fuel station and supermarkets. Take water and a snack, and use the river stop as a pause, not a destination. Early morning, with mist lifting off the Weser and the sound of birds, is the time that suits it best.
- Höxter old town view
sight
Höxter sits on the west bank of the Weser, one of the old river towns of the Weserbergland, and its centre is a close-packed cluster of half-timbered houses and a church tower. This is the view you want: the roofs, the river and the forested hills beyond. The town has thirty thousand people if you count its surrounding villages, and a long history that began when the Franks built a river crossing here.
The great monument is just outside the town, at Corvey. This Carolingian abbey, founded in the ninth century, has a massive westwork, a fortress-like entrance hall, that survives almost unchanged, and it was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2014. Corvey was one of the great centres of learning in medieval Germany, and later its library became one of the richest in the country. The poet Hoffmann von Fallersleben, who wrote the words of the German national anthem, worked as librarian here and is buried in the abbey grounds.
The roads around Höxter are a pleasure. The Weser valley is broad and green, and the road follows the river, with low hills and forests rising on both sides. Further on, the Solling opens into a huge area of beech and spruce forest, with quiet roads that wind through the trees and over low passes. The bends are gentle and flowing, with very little traffic, and in the early morning there is often mist on the river. Autumn and late spring are the best seasons.
Fuel is easy in Höxter, which has several stations and supermarkets, and Boffzen and Fürstenberg are smaller villages along the river. Fürstenberg is known for its porcelain, made there since the eighteenth century. Park near the old town, walk to the river and find a bench, and you have the best view in the area. A bakery coffee and a slice of cake is the right reward for the miles, and there are plenty of places to buy them. The light in late afternoon on the old roofs is lovely.
- Back to Hannover
finish
The ride ends where it began, at the foot of the Deister near Springe, with the long wooded ridge behind you and the plain of Hannover stretching away in front. After a day in the forests of the Solling and the quiet valleys of the Weser, the return is a gentle comedown, with roads that grow straighter and busier as the city gets closer. The ridge itself is a good landmark, a long dark line against the sky that tells you home is near.
Bad Münder am Deister, a spa town of nearly nineteen thousand, lies just to the south, and it has been known for its salt springs for centuries. The old centre has timber houses and a spa park, and it is a pleasant place to finish the day with a coffee. Further south along the Weser, a ride of less than an hour, lies Hamelin, the town of the Pied Piper. According to the legend, a stranger in colourful clothes led the rats and later the children of the town away with his music, a story that has been told since the Middle Ages and still draws visitors to Hamelin.
The road home runs through gentle farmland, with wide fields of wheat and sugar beet, and the last light of the day catching the church towers. The Deister's beech forest, which covers the ridge, turns golden in autumn, and the roads that climb through it are quiet and winding. Watch for deer at dusk, because they cross the road without warning, and for cyclists on the way back in.
Springe has plenty of fuel and food, and Wennigsen, a larger village six kilometres away, offers more of the same. It is a good place to stop, check your bike, and take a long look at the evening sky. The weather over the Deister can change quickly, so if clouds are building, put your waterproofs on before you set off for the last leg. It's an easy, comfortable finish, and the right kind of ending to a long day.