Cycle tour through the Central Black Forest

Women with big, red bollen hats and mighty farmhouses with the characteristic hipped roof - the cliché lives on, at least at the Vogtsbauernhof in Gutach. The open-air museum impressively depicts life in the Black Forest over the past 400 years. The kitschy, beautiful houses are located in the Gutach Valley, just a short detour away from our cycle route along the Kinzig.

From the Rhine plain near Offenburg, the route winds its way through the longest Black Forest valley past the vineyards of the Ortenau up into the wooded mountains. From Alpirsbach, the village with the famous monastery brewery, things get strenuous: the tarmac road turns into forest paths and climbs noticeably towards Freudenstadt. After the Kinzig, the small river Murg accompanies us back down into the Rhine Valley 500 metres below.

The Tour de Murg cycle route runs for almost 70 kilometres past Baiersbronn, the town with the highest density of Michelin stars in Germany, past towns with beautiful half-timbered houses and past Gaggenau, the place for fine electric cookers and Daimler Unimogs. After Rastatt, our route turns into the Rhine Valley cycle path. From here, it's a leisurely cycle back to the starting point in Ortenau.

GPS data

You can find the GPX track for this tour in the MYBIKE Collection on komoot

Journey:
Many places in the Rhine Valley, such as Offenburg and Rastatt, are well integrated into the Deutsche Bahn network. You can change trains at several stations throughout the Murg Valley, www.bahn.de

Tour combinations:
The TREKKINGBIKE Black Forest circuit offers connections to the Rhine Valley cycle path, among others, Nature Park Cycle Route Black Forest Centre/North, Nagold cycle pathto the Roman Route Ortenau and to the Monastery Route Northern Black Forest.

Accommodation tips:
Gasthaus Storchen in Haslach, Kinzigtal, www.hotel-storchen.de
Kurgarten-Hotel in Wolfach, www.kurgarten-hotel.de
Gasthof-Hotel Zur Blume in Kuppenheim an der Murg, www.blume-kuppenheim.de
Kohler's Hotel Engel in Bühl-Vimbuch, www.engel-vimbuch.de
Hotel Adler in Freudenstadt, www.adler-fds.de

Maps and literature:
Kompass map set Wk886 with two maps "Black Forest North" 1:50,000 , 10 euros.
Landesvermessungsamt Baden-Württemberg cycle map "Nördlicher Schwarzwald" 1:75,000 for 4.90 euros.
Esterbauer Bikeline cycle tour book "Fluss-Radwege Schwarzwald" 1:75,000 for 13.90 euros.

Information:
Black Forest Tourism, Tel. 0761/896460, www.schwarzwald-tourismus.info;
Ortenau Tourism, Tel. 0781/805-0, www.ortenau-tourismus.de

The article was published in Trekkingbike issue 5/2016.