Teutoburg and Externsteine Long Sweep

For riders who accept distance to get a proper ridge-road day.

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Why this ride

For riders who accept distance to get a proper ridge-road day. 347 km round from Großgoltern - plan on about 7 h 13 of riding. On the way it passes Bückeburg and Bad Iburg forest. The climbs: Externsteine rock sight and Detmold ridge road. Long stretches are under trees.

Roadbook

1. Hannover west escape start

   Hannover has a reputation for being flat, grey and efficient, which is mostly unfair, though to be honest the first twenty kilometres west of town will not change your mind. The starting point here sits on the Calenberg lowland, a farming plain of big fields, hedgerows and straight roads, just outside the built-up edge and close to the villages of Großgoltern and Egestorf. The Deister ridge lies not far to the south-west, and that low range of wooded hills is the first real promise of curves for anyone leaving the city in that direction.

   What makes this a good escape is how quickly the traffic thins. Within minutes of leaving the ring road you are on quiet country roads that link small villages with church towers and brick farmhouses, most with a barn big enough to swallow a bus. The surface is mostly decent, though the plain gets muddy at harvest and the cross-winds can be annoying. It is not dramatic riding, but it is the smooth kind, good for warming up before the route heads toward the hills. Early morning is best, when the mist lies in the fields and the light comes in low and gold.

   The region has a long history as a crossing point. The old trade roads between the Rhine and the Elbe ran through here, and the Hanoverian dynasty that later gave Britain its Georgian kings started from this modest city. The Leine and the Deister coalfields shaped the area's economy for centuries, and the old mining towns on the ridge still carry the memory. Local food is hearty; in the villages you are more likely to find a bakery with a cake counter than anything exotic.

   Egestorf is the nearest sizeable place, with nearly eight thousand people, so you will find fuel and a supermarket there, and Hannover itself has every service you can imagine behind you. Small places like Großgoltern are quieter, so fill up beforehand. In the cool part of the year the air smells of damp earth and woodsmoke, and the wind off the plain can be sharp, so bring a layer. Treat this stop as the start of the day, a place to check your tyres, eat something solid and look south at the hills.

2. Bückeburg fuel gate fuel

   Fuel is available here and in the neighbouring villages, and the main street has bakeries and cafes. The country around it is flat and fertile, with the Weser some kilometres to the west and the low ridge of the Bückeberge to the south.

   This is also an army town of a quiet sort. The German army's aviation school and a helicopter museum are based here, and the Hubschraubermuseum, a collection of rotary-wing aircraft from many countries, attracts visitors. The sight of helicopters clattering over the fields is a common one, and the museum has a decent collection, including some oddities from the Cold War.

   The riding in the area is relaxed and rural, over small roads that run through villages and past fields of wheat and sugar beet. The surface varies, and bends are gentle, with the Bückeberge and the Weser offering a few hills. Traffic is light on the minor roads, though the main road to Hannover can be busy with trucks. The best times are spring, when the rapeseed is in bloom, and early autumn, when the beech woods turn red.

   Bückeburg's town church, finished in 1615, was one of the first major Protestant churches built in Germany, and its Baroque facade is worth a look. The town is a pleasant place for a coffee, and the market square has a few attractive buildings. Ahnsen, a village three and a half kilometres away, has a quiet lane and a pub, but little else. If you intend to push on towards the Weserbergland or the Teutoburg Forest, fill up here, as services thin out in the hills. A short walk through the town park offers shade and a quiet bench.

3. Bad Iburg forest return food

   The hills here are not high, no more than three hundred metres or so, but they are steep, well wooded and cut with small valleys, and the road in from the plain climbs through beech forest with a satisfying series of bends. The town has fuel, bakeries and several inns, and it is a pleasant place for a late lunch.

   Above the town stands the castle of Iburg, once a Benedictine abbey and later the residence of the prince-bishops of Osnabrück. It is a large and handsome complex, with a mix of medieval and baroque buildings, and it is open to visitors. In 1668 Sophie Charlotte, later the first queen of Prussia, was born here, and the rooms hold a small museum about her. The castle stands on a ridge, with a fine view over the town and the forest, and the walk up from the market takes about ten minutes.

   Bad Iburg is a Kneipp spa, a place where the water cure promoted by the Bavarian priest Sebastian Kneipp is practised, and you will see small pools in the park where visitors stand in cold water up to their knees. The air is clean, the forest paths are well marked, and the Hermannsweg, a long-distance trail, runs along the ridge. The ridge road offers good riding, with gentle climbs and descents, long views to the north and a surface that is generally smooth. Traffic is heavy on summer weekends, when families come to walk.

   Lienen, four kilometres away, has a quiet centre and a fine church. For food, look for the regional dishes of Westphalia: Pfefferpotthast, a spicy beef stew, and Pumpernickel, the dense dark rye bread, served with ham and good butter. In the evening, the light is soft over the forest, and the air smells of pine and woodsmoke. It is a sensible place to stop for the night, and an even better place to finish a day.

4. Externsteine rock sight pass

   The Externsteine are a row of sandstone towers that rise from the Teutoburg Forest like fingers, some nearly forty metres high, weathered into strange shapes and standing apart from the surrounding hills. They are among the most famous natural monuments in Germany, and a place where history, legend and politics have mingled for centuries.

   On the largest rock, a relief carved in about 1115 shows the Descent from the Cross, one of the greatest medieval stone carvings in northern Europe, with a sculpted Christ and mourners, and a path and stairs lead to a chapel carved into the rock. Many people believe that the rocks were a pagan holy place before that, though the evidence is thin. In the twentieth century, the Nazis made use of the site in their invented version of German prehistory, and the rocks are still sometimes visited by groups with questionable beliefs, which is why the guides take care to tell the history straight.

   The nearest town is Horn-Bad Meinberg, with about seven thousand people in the Horn area, and the larger city of Detmold is a short ride away. The roads through the Teutoburg Forest are among the best in this part of Germany, with smooth surfaces, long bends and climbs through beech and spruce woods, past little villages and ponds. At weekends, they are busy with riders, so watch for fast groups and take your time.

   Fuel and food are in Horn and Detmold, and a small cafe near the rocks sells coffee and cake. The site is easy to reach from the road. Early morning is a good time to visit, when the mist hangs between the rocks and the crowd has not yet arrived. In spring and autumn, the beech forest is at its best, and in winter the rocks can be icy.

5. Detmold ridge road pass

   Detmold has a giant looking over its shoulder. On a hill in the Teutoburg Forest above the city stands the Hermannsdenkmal, a copper statue of the Germanic chieftain Arminius, who defeated three Roman legions in the year 9 AD, raised on a stone base and holding a sword to the sky. It was completed in 1875 after decades of work, in the first flush of German national feeling, and at about fifty metres is among the tallest statues in the country. The exact site of the battle is still debated, and most scholars think it took place farther north, at Kalkriese.

   The city itself, with about seventy-four thousand people, was the seat of the princes of Lippe and still has a palace in the Weser Renaissance style, with fine gables and a courtyard. Johannes Brahms worked here as a court musician in the late 1850s, teaching the princess and conducting the choir, and the city is proud of the connection. The open-air museum, the largest of its kind in Germany, has hundreds of old farmhouses, mills and workshops moved from all over Westphalia and set in a wooded landscape, and it makes a fascinating afternoon.

   For riders, the Teutoburg Forest ridge road, the Hermannsweg road and the lanes that climb through the beech woods are a delight, with smooth surfaces and tight, flowing bends. The ridge is steep on the eastern side, and the views from the viewpoints are excellent. Fuel, bike shops, hotels and restaurants are all available in Detmold, and the old town has a pedestrian zone with cafes.

   The weather is mild but changeable, with rain at any time of year. In summer, the forest is cool and shady, while in autumn the beech leaves turn a deep copper. Come on a weekday, since weekends are busy with day trippers. A visit to the monument, followed by a climb up its stairs for the view, makes a fine break.

6. Lemgo old-town stop scenic

   Lemgo is one of those German towns where the old centre survived intact, a mass of half-timbered and stone gabled houses in the Weser Renaissance style, grouped around a market place and a clutch of churches. The town of about forty-two thousand people lies in the Lippe region in eastern North Rhine-Westphalia, on the edge of the Teutoburg Forest, and was once a member of the Hanseatic League, which explains the wealth of building from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

   The most famous house is the Hexenbürgermeisterhaus, the witch mayor's house, with an elaborate facade of carved stone, built by a wealthy family in 1571 and later home to a mayor who presided over witch trials in the seventeenth century, when dozens of people in Lemgo were executed. The house now holds a museum that explains the period, and it is an interesting if sombre stop. The Rathaus, the town hall, is also remarkable, with a row of oriel windows and an arcaded apothecary wing, and the market square in front is the heart of the town, with cafés spilling outdoors on warm days.

   For motorcyclists, Lemgo is a cultural stop and a place to refuel, since it has everything: petrol stations, restaurants, bakeries and supermarkets. The old centre is largely pedestrianised, so park at the edge and walk in. The roads surrounding it, through the Extertal and across the hills of the Lippe uplands, are quiet and winding, with forest and farm views, and short, steep climbs that give some of the best riding in this part of the country. Surfaces are generally good, and speed limits in the villages are checked.

   The region is known for its asparagus in spring, for pumpernickel, ham and Pickert, a local potato bread, and for the beer from small breweries. Summers are warm and green, and autumn brings misty mornings with wood smoke in the air. Be careful with tram-style cobbles in the centre, which are slippery after rain, and with farm vehicles on the narrow lanes. A short walk along the old town streets in the evening, once the day trippers have gone, is worth the effort.

7. Back to Hannover finish

   The last hour of a long ride is often the quietest, and the approach to Hannover from the west has a calm of its own. The point lies in the Calenberg country, near the villages of Großgoltern and Groß Munzel, with the dark ridge of the Deister to the south and the flat plain of the Leine stretching away to the north. Egestorf, five kilometres away, has the nearest shops and fuel, and Barsinghausen is just beyond.

   If you are coming home from the Teutoburg Forest and the Externsteine, you have had a long day. The Externsteine, a group of tall sandstone pillars in the forest near Horn-Bad Meinberg, have been a place of pilgrimage and speculation for centuries. A medieval relief carved into the rock shows the descent from the cross, and nobody quite knows what earlier peoples may have done there. They make a striking contrast with the plain and orderly fields around Hannover, which seem tame by comparison.

   The country here is soft and ordinary and all the more restful for it. The roads run straight across fields of sugar beet and wheat, interrupted by small brick villages with square church towers, and the Deister's beech forest lifts the horizon to the south. In late afternoon the light slants across the stubble, and the long shadows of the hedgerows stripe the road. A sudden shower can sweep across the plain in minutes, so keep an eye on the sky to the west.

   For a final stop, Egestorf has a bakery and a couple of cafés, and Barsinghausen, with its fourteen thousand people, has everything. The local coal mining ended in the 1950s, and the old pithead buildings are now part of a museum, which tells the story of the Deister's underground past. If you have half an hour, walk into the forest and look at the old mining paths. Then switch the engine on, and the last stretch into the city is a gentle glide.

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