Spring 2024 Bicycle Tour Planning

In the beginning, the only idea was to cycle the 500 km down the Weser. But that was somehow too short and I didn't want to take the train back home. If anything, I wanted to do the whole tour by bike. So I planned the way back. Would I head south again in the east at the former inner-German border or follow the Ems along the western German border and then through the Ruhr area back to Hesse?

We in Hesse always have to drive around 500 km to get to the sea or the high mountains. If I'm going to cycle to the sea, then it's best to stay there as long as possible. So the idea of cycling to the ocean and back was born.

Instead of cycling the tour against clockwise - first along the Weser, then along the coast to the west and finally through the low mountain range - I thought it would be better to cycle clockwise. First there are around 1600 meters of elevation gain and then it becomes flat (the difficult part at the beginning). Riding north and east along the coast is much easier, as the wind usually comes from the southwest. Finally, as originally planned, along the Weser back to start.

Komoot is a great tool for planning the route in detail. First set the key points in broad strokes and have the route calculated. Then create a multi-day collection and ride each section on the map again and make corrections. The only annoying thing was that Komoot doesn't always want to stay on the cycle paths. There is no Prefer cycle path in any case in the settings. Going through the entire route again by hand and making corrections is a lot of work, but should definitely be done.

The result is the 21 sections that can be found further down the page.