Steinhuder Meer and Rehburg Hills
A 121 km loop from Hannover north-west edge
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Why this ride
Water, small lanes and easy rhythm north-west of the city. Out of Garbsen-Mitte and back again: 121 km, roughly 2 h 28 in the saddle. On the way it passes Wunstorf, Loccum abbey sight and Mardorf lake road. Rehburg hills is the high point. The line favours views over speed.
Roadbook
- Hannover north-west edge
start
Garbsen is a big, flat suburb of Hannover, made mostly of new housing, shopping streets and industry, and it has no pretensions beyond being a practical place to start. The Mittelland Canal runs close by, carrying barges between the Rhine and the Elbe, and the whole area lies on the edge of the North German Plain, where the sky takes up most of the view. That, however, is the point. Within twenty minutes you are among fields, woods and moorland, and the city has gone.
The goal is Steinhuder Meer, the largest lake in Lower Saxony, which lies about thirty kilometres to the north-west. It is wide, with a surface of some thirty square kilometres, and astonishingly shallow, only about three metres deep at the most, so that on a calm day it looks like a large silver dish laid on the land. In the middle sits Wilhelmstein, a tiny artificial island with a fortress that Count Wilhelm of Schaumburg-Lippe built in the 1760s as a military school, one of the odd little relics of German princely life. Boats cross to it from the village of Steinhude, whose narrow lanes of low houses are full of smokehouses selling eel, the local speciality, which you may like or loathe.
The riding is gentle. The roads around the lake run through reed beds, birch woods and bog, with plenty of long, flat straights and the occasional bend. Further west, the Rehburg Hills rise to a modest height, a ridge of forest with a few sweeping gradients and quiet roads through beech woods, an unexpected relief after the flatlands. This is relaxing country rather than a technical challenge. The best months are May to September, with wind off the lake a constant, and early morning mist over the moor in autumn.
The moors around the lake are a nature reserve, and in spring and autumn the birdlife is remarkable, with cranes, ospreys and great numbers of geese passing through. Garbsen and nearby suburbs offer all the fuel stations, supermarkets and bakeries you could want, so fill the tank here, since the villages near the lake are small. On sunny weekends the shores and lanes are full of cyclists and families, so allow time. A plate of smoked eel or a simple Matjes herring with potatoes, eaten by the water, is a fitting reward.
- Wunstorf fuel gate
fuel
Wunstorf has an airbase and a lake, and neither is what you expect from the name. The town, with about forty-two thousand people, lies on the Leine west of Hanover, and the nearby military airfield is home to the German Air Force's transport aircraft. The lake is the Steinhuder Meer, a short ride to the north, the largest lake in north-west Germany and so shallow that you can nearly wade across it. It is a popular place for sailing, with the little town of Steinhude on its southern shore selling smoked eel to visitors.
Wunstorf began around a convent founded in the ninth century, and the old collegiate church still stands, a plain stone building. The town is a practical stop, with fuel stations, supermarkets and bakeries, and the roads converge here from Hanover, Nienburg and the Weser. It is a good place to fill the tank at the start of a ride, with a quick coffee before you set off.
The country around the Steinhuder Meer is flat, with moors, meadows and reeds, and the roads run straight and quiet, with wide skies and wind as the main hazard. A nature park surrounds the lake, with trails and birdwatching points, and in spring and autumn the migrating birds are a draw. The ride is gentle, and it makes a good warm-up for the hills to the south and west.
Weather in the plain can be changeable, with a cold wind off the lake in spring and autumn. Summer is warm and pleasant, but weekends bring a lot of traffic from Hanover, so go early. A smoked eel sandwich at the lake, a bag of fresh strawberries from a farm stall and a quiet hour on the shore are the pleasures of a day here. Steinhude is also known for the little sailing boats called Auswanderer, flat-bottomed and low in the water, a reminder that the lake is shallow enough that hardly anyone can drown in it.
- Loccum abbey sight
sight
The old Cistercian abbey of Loccum stands among the fields and forests of western Lower Saxony, about four kilometres from the town of Rehburg-Loccum, and it has been here since 1163. That alone makes it an unusual place, since it survived the Reformation and became Protestant without being dissolved, and it is still a Lutheran monastic community, where trainee pastors study and monks live much as they did centuries ago. The long brick church, with its plain, high-vaulted interior, is a fine example of the austere Cistercian style.
The Cistercians chose their sites with care, favouring quiet valleys with clean water and good soil, and Loccum is a textbook case: a green, well-watered hollow, with ponds and meadows around the cloister buildings. The monks cleared forest, drained marshes and improved the land, and over the centuries the abbey grew rich and powerful. The abbot still has a special status in the Lutheran church, a curious relic of that past.
Riding here from Hannover brings you through a flat, green landscape, with the Rehburg hills rising gently to the south and the great shallow lake of Steinhuder Meer lying to the east, the largest lake in Lower Saxony. The roads are quiet and straight, with the occasional bend through woodland, and cyclists are common. Sandy soils and pine woods mix with fields of maize and wheat, and the villages are small and prosperous.
Rehburg-Loccum has just under eleven thousand people and has fuel, shops and a few places to eat, while Leese and Wölpinghausen are smaller. The abbey grounds are open to visitors, though church services and events can limit access, so check before you come. Walk through the cloister if you can, and listen to the silence. It is a rare quiet spot for a rider, and a good place to turn the engine off for ten minutes and think about nothing at all.
- Rehburg hills
pass
Rehburg-Loccum lies on the north edge of the Rehburg hills, a modest ridge of wooded sandstone that rises from the flat plain west of Hannover, and for riders from the city it is the nearest thing to a mountain. The hills are not high by any measure, but they are covered in beech and oak, and the roads that cross them climb and twist in a way the plain never does, with a sense of enclosure and a welcome shade in summer.
The town takes its second name from Loccum, a Cistercian monastery founded in the twelfth century that remains one of the best-preserved medieval abbeys in northern Germany. After the Reformation it became a Protestant institution and is still a centre of the Lutheran church, with a seminary for pastors. The brick church, its plain Romanesque and early Gothic lines, and the cloister with its stone vaults are open to visitors, and the quiet of the place is striking. The monks' old fishponds and farms still shape the landscape around it.
Rehburg itself is a small spa, with a spring and a park, and it has a gentle, old-fashioned air. The hills above are criss-crossed by walking paths, and the views from the ridge reach over the plain toward the Steinhuder Meer, the large shallow lake a short distance to the east. On clear days the water gleams between the trees.
The roads are a mix of smooth and patched, with moderate bends, and the traffic is local, with some weekend riders from Hannover. The climbs are short and the descents open, so the ride feels like a pleasant exercise rather than a challenge. Wet leaves in autumn can be slippery on the shaded bends, and in winter ice may linger in the hollows.
The town has nearly eleven thousand people, so fuel, shops and cafes are easily found. Cafes near the monastery serve coffee and cake, and the grounds are a pleasant place to rest. Spring, when the beech leaves emerge a vivid green, and autumn, when they turn copper, are the best times for the ride.
- Mardorf lake road
swim
The Steinhuder Meer is the biggest lake in Lower Saxony, and it is shockingly shallow: for most of its area it is no more than a couple of metres deep, so that on a hot day you can wade a long way out and still stand. Mardorf, on the north shore, is the beach side, with a long strip of sand, a promenade and a swimming area, and the water warms up quickly in summer, so it is a pleasant place to cool off after a day in the saddle.
The lake is a favourite playground for sailors from Hannover, and its flat water and steady breeze suit small dinghies and windsurfers. The shallowness also makes it a sanctuary for birds. Reedbeds around the shore hold herons, grebes and many ducks, and the moorland to the north, the Meerbruch nature reserve, is a protected area of bog and wet woodland. The famous local food is smoked eel, taken from the lake and served in the fish restaurants of Mardorf and Steinhude, a tradition that goes back centuries.
On an island in the middle stands the Wilhelmstein, a small fortress built in the eighteenth century by Count Wilhelm of Schaumburg-Lippe, one of the more inventive minds of his age. He built it on an artificial island as a military school and a stronghold for his tiny state, and it was one of the earliest places to train officers in a scientific manner. Small boats run to it from the shore in summer, and a visit is a fine excursion.
The lakeside road is flat and gentle, with long views of water through the trees and a surface that is generally good, though busy on warm weekends when Hannover empties onto the shore. Parking at Mardorf fills early. Cyclists and walkers share the paths and lanes, so ride calmly. Fuel is not abundant right on the shore; Rehburg-Loccum, eight kilometres away, and Hagenburg are better bets for stations and shops.
The water is cool in June and warm by August. A morning swim and a plate of smoked eel make a good midday break, and the sunset over the lake from the western shore is memorable.
- Neustadt am Rübenberge food stop
stop
Neustadt am Rübenberge is a town that spreads wide across the flat country northwest of Hannover, one of the larger municipalities in Lower Saxony by area, with some forty-six thousand people living in the centre and dozens of villages around it. The Leine river slides past the old town, which has a castle called Landestrost from the sixteenth century, and the broad, low plain around it is where the Hanoverian farmers grew their wealth.
This is a food stop, in the plainest sense of the phrase. The town centre has bakeries, cafés and restaurants, and you should be able to find a decent plate of schnitzel or a currywurst, a German classic, without any trouble. If you want something more local, look for asparagus in spring and for smoked fish in the shops. Do not expect the town to be pretty, because it was rebuilt in a practical way, but it is friendly, and the market square is a comfortable place to sit.
Nearby, the great moorland and shallow lake of Steinhuder Meer, north-west of here, are worth a detour. The lake is only a couple of metres deep, and it is popular with sailors, who can wade out into the water if they run aground. The old moors around it are protected and full of birds, and the villages on the shore, such as Mardorf, serve smoked eel, a local speciality.
Fuel is easy, since Neustadt has stations along the main roads, and the larger town of Wunstorf lies nine kilometres south for backup. The roads out of town are flat and straight, running through farmland, with the occasional wind-bent tree and a dusting of farm mud. Take it easy through the villages, where the speed limits are enforced, and watch for tractors. It is a modest, practical stop, and it does what it says on the label.
- Back to Hannover north-west edge
finish
back to Hannover north-west edge closes the day.