Last week I couldn’t stand it anymore. I felt like the city and its streets and buildings and people are closing in on me :/. When I went jogging the last couple of times, I’ve found a charming route I wanted to explore further, but having been jogging for already close to an hour, I decided to turn back and to go that route sometime later by bike.
Last week’s Thursday, I’ve asked a friend of mine, Brianne, who came to Germany from Australia about a year ago, if she wanted to join me to see some of the closer and less-visited parts of Rostock’s hinterlands. My timing was impeccable as she’d gotten a new bicycle just two days before our planned tour, and she was eager to try out. Flashforward to Thursday, I picked her up at her’s and we went on through Rostock to leave the city for the afternoon. Now, I can’t tell you how to reach the starting point of the tour in the best and quickest way since depending on where you live in Rostock, you might have to take a few or more turns. And if you’re from the eastern parts of Rostock or not from Rostock at all, you might have even bigger distances to cover. While it can be a bit stressful to drive around traffic in Rostock, the route will make up for that inconvenience – and that much I’m willing to guarantee you!
Our real starting point was at the western end of Reutershagen, Rostock, a road called Bonhoefferstraße due west and over a bridge that crosses the Stadtautobahn, Barnstorfer Ring (103) and goes parallel to the Fritz-Reuter allotment garden area. We’ve followed the road until it made a small bend to the right towards Vorweden, a nature preserve in Lambrechtshagen.
It’s an easy route to ride on and we followed it for roughly a kilometre, passing numerous horses on a paddock to the left, which already made me feel like leaving the city behind, and I immediately felt more grounded.
The forest of Vorweden itself has lots of smaller and lesser trodden paths branching out from the main road like hairy strands but in different directions. These paths are suitable for bicycles as the beach is for cars, unless you have a mountain bike of course 🙂 but if you want to go on foot for a while and rest there, I definitely recommend checking out some of these paths and exploring the lush and bewitching nature preserve (just make sure to abide by the rules and don’t leave anything that doesn’t belong in a forest. Many national parks and reserves have their own specific rules but some are very common and apply to every part of nature.
The forest of Vorweden is somewhat small in space but thickly grown; a magnificent and small oasis of calm in the middle of its surrounding leafy and far-flung fields. Standing at the waldessaum (a German and more literary word for “edge of the forest”) allows for amazing and far-reaching views, stretching kilometres to the horizon and painting forests against the pale-blue sky; in those parts you feel easily connected to nature and it’s easy to forget about your worries and just be in the moment. In the heart of the forest, the lavish and almost impenetrable treetops only allow some sunrays coming through in a rhythmic manner, making the light move and bounce around and making the leaves dance and colour the leaves in dark and in soft and bright greens ever so often.
After we’d crossed the forest and followed the road, we took a few turns, passing by far-reaching fields, twisted and serpentine roads. Another turn lead us to Parkentin we reached after a kilometre and a half. In the centre of town, we weren’t sure where to go to next and I spotted an old and wooden sign saying “Klosterteiche” (monastery ponds) which sounded delightful and worth checking out because I immediately had this image of an old monastery in my mind and I’m hugely interested in history, especially in German medieval history, and its remnants.
As we rode on, a small lake on the left appeared, surrounded by birches and lime trees. Just a few meters further, my friend saw a sign promising coffee and after an hour of riding, and with us being coffee lovers we decided to stop then and refill our coffee and energy levels. The path to the fishing farm was a little bit obscure and the lack of visitors, who usually indicate some sort of attraction and that you’re on the right track, wasn’t helping either. But with a little bit of patience and curiosity we reached the farm.
The farm had its own orchard (where we rested after ordering coffee and tea), a lovely herb garden, an enchanting small pond and a pottery workshop (with a pleasingly cluttered backyard) where they also offer courses. Brianne was seriously impressed that a place like this just popped seemingly out in the middle of nowhere, or in the “whoop-whoop” as she’d say in Australian English. We drank our coffee and had some biscuits, making a nice little picnic.
Although we actually hadn’t reached the monastery ponds before we left (we decided to return to Rostock), we wanted to take a small detour towards the lake we came by before reaching the fishing farm. After we had another little rest and a few snacks we had brought along with us we made back for Rostock and after a slow-paced and splendid ride alongside vast canola fields we would reach the city.
If you ever feel like escaping the city life, even for a few hours, you don’t much planning because many roads lead you to tranquility and there is much to explore. If you need a starting point, however, I highly recommend our route to Parkentin, starting in Vorweden.
