Why you cant motorcycle tour Germany without doing the Black Forest

Triberg Wasserfall

Deep inside the dense and haunting Black Forest lies Germany’s highest waterfall in the little town of Triberg. Water plummets from the river Gutach with a descent of 163 metres over seven naturally created ledges to create an arresting show of natural beauty. Magellan’s Black Forest tour has a rest day in this area and the waterfall is always a firm favourite for a day off the bike in the enigmatic trees!

The waterfall is open all year round, with a nice cafe serving drinks and food, making it the perfect place for a stop to relax and enjoy the scenery. There’s hiking trails around the waterfall and into the forest that will throw you into a world you’ve only read about in fairytales.

During the winter months admission costs €3.50 and in the summer €5.00.

Baden Baden’s tradition as a spa resort dates back over 2,000 years. The baths here have hosted famous figures from Roman emperors to Napoleon. It remains a popular tourist attraction to this day, with people coming to reap the benefits of the healing powers of its hot springs. The water bubbles up from 2,000 metres below ground and contains a whole host of restorative minerals to alleviate a variety of illnesses and generally create a feeling of wellbeing.

Riders on our tours have raved about having a soak in the baths to relax their tired muscles on a rest day, although something to bare in mind is there’s no dress code required, and the whole full nudity thing can take some getting used to for our english sensibilities!

This lesser known road running south of Schiltach may not have the reputation of the B500, but it is not to be sniffed at with some favouring the B492 for its quietness. While it may not have hairpins, the scenery certainly makes up for it and is something to be rivalled, deep in the gorge with high sided rock formations on one side and deep forest on the other providing breaks every now and then for clear views down into the valley. Unlike the B500 there are no cameras, so it’s easy enough to pick up a bit of speed on the open stretches!

Lake Titisee is the largest natural lake in the Black Forest stretching for 2 kilometres. The lake is famed for its pure, clear waters, the reason for this is that the lake was formed by the Feldberg glacier, when the area was home to sabre tooth tigers and woolly mammoths. When the glacier moved on, what was left was Lake Titisee as we know it. With the forest and mountains providing an arresting backdrop the area is a popular tourist attraction, with a vast array of outdoor activities including walking trails that give unadulterated views over the valley, windsurfing and sailing. With plenty of beer gardens there’s also the option to just soak up the rays with a nice cold beer!
Lake Constance on the Rhine sits at the northern foot of the Alps, at 63 kilometres in length it is made up of three bodies of water: The Obersee (upper Lake Constance), the Untersee (lower Lake Constance) and the connecting stretch of the Rhine – The Seerhein. Formed by the Rhine Glacier during the ice age, the lake stretches across Germany, Switzerland and Austria making it the third largest freshwater lake in Europe.
Both lakes are featured on our rideout days, and are very popular with customers looking for a day of relaxing by the water.

Another Magellan hidden gem, passing through typical fairytale towns with the added bonus of plenty of places to stop for some of that famous Black Forest Gateau. Along this route you will see several villages with people dressed in lederhosen. The B294 Black Forest valley route goes through Freiburg, Waldkirch, Haslach and Hausach o Freudenstadt. A great thing to stop in at on this road is the Open Air Black Forest museum, giving visitors a chance to see how people lived and worked in the Black Forest farmhouses in the last 400 years.

With construction taking over 300 years and ancient nanotechnology being used to tint its windows red, the Freiburg Minster is a distinctive landmark in the Black Forest. It was completed in the middle ages and amazingly still stands to this day, surviving the bombing raids of 1994 that destroyed all of the houses on the west and north side of the market.

Visitors to the church can walk up the impressive 116 metre high tower to get fantastic views out over the city. Opening times are 9.30am – 5pm on working days and 1pm – 5pm on Sundays. The church is also a popular rideout day option on the tours.