This tour leads from Sigmaringen through the Upper Danube Valley to Beuron.
There we leave the Danube in the direction of Rottweil, past the Lemberg, the highest mountain in the Swabian Alb, and then ride along winding roads, touching the Albtrauf several times, via Albstadt to Lichtenstein Castle and back to the starting point.
The sensational coloration of the trees in the mixed forests of the Swabian Alb makes this route particularly attractive. This is why this tour, with its many mountain passages and refreshment stops, is particularly suitable for the end of the season.
Distance: 227 kilometers
Travel time: from 4 hours, depending on length of stay
Route Kurviger.de: kurv.gr/DmwfH
Sigmaringen – Beuron
The tour starts with a real hit in Sigmaringen. The castle overlooking the town is hard to miss (video timeline 0:20) and for the only time that day you wish that the red traffic light phase on the B32 would last as long as possible. On the left is the bridge over the Danube into the old town, half-left above is the view of the castle, below is the Danube, adorned by trees in the most magnificent colors. All too soon, the traffic lights turn green and we concentrate on the road and the tunnel portal through the Panthelstein. We continue straight ahead, not even realizing that we have left the main road shortly after the tunnel and are heading straight into the Upper Danube Valley on a country road.
Up to behind Laiz, this route offers the opportunity to leave campers and other rolling barriers behind you ( Video Timeline 1:04) and then enjoy an uninterrupted view of the road and the cliffs to the right, which soon rise vertically. After Dietfurt, it gets really narrow, and where the road has no more space between the Danube and the edge of the valley, the rocks are provided with single-lane tunnels, whereby bikers could easily do without the traffic lights ( Video Timeline 3:30).
The tracks of the Danube Valley Railway run in between and despite all these traffic routes, nature remains breathtakingly present. Again and again I find myself looking far more into the landscape than is advisable on the winding route.
Fortunately, there are plenty of opportunities to stop, enjoy the scenery and do something good for your stomach. After Thiergarten, the Neumühle inn beckons with a fabulous terrace and a little further on, you virtually drive through the terrace of the mill in Neidingen. In Hausen im Tal, the Gasthof Bahnhof with the next terrace is on the right. Beuron (waypoint 1) soon appears.
The town is completely dominated by the archabbey and the monastery church and if you want to stretch your legs, you can leave your car in the huge parking lot behind the Danube bridge and take a look at the walls.
Of course, you can also stop for a bite to eat there, but I’m drawn onwards, up the hairpin bends of the mountain road over to Bärenthal.



Bärenthal – Rottweil
Anyone who thinks that leaving the Danube valley means that most of the route has been completed is very much mistaken. The saddle over the edge of the valley is 150 meters high and so the Integra and I make a quick 250 meters up and down over the 7 km.
And it goes on and on. At Gosheim I cross the region of the 10 thousand meter peaks and right next to the biathlon center is the highest point of the tour at 975m. Immediately after the apex, the descent to Gosheim is a vertical straight with an 18% gradient.
The view of the highest mountain in the Swabian Alb, the Lemberg, and the surrounding table mountains is one of the highlights of the tour. It’s like being in an airplane on approach, fabulous. It doesn’t matter that the road runs through the village. You don’t want to drive faster than the permitted 50 km/h anyway.
I’m gradually getting hungry, so I take the long road via Frittlingen down to the Baar, the narrow plateau that separates the Black Forest from the Swabian Alb. Nowhere are the two low mountain ranges closer than here.
In Rottweil, at the Chinese restaurant in the Saline industrial area (waypoint 4), the lowest point of the entire tour is 560 meters above sea level.
Lots of contrasts on such a short distance!



Rottweil – Albstadt – Lichtenstein Castle
An hour later, freshly refreshed, we head back up towards the Albtrauf. The route avoids the eternally congested main roads, but after a short, traffic-light-filled stretch out of Göllsdorf, it leads up to Feckenhausen in serpentines and after Tieringen ( Waypoint 5) Kurviger shows me almost 900 meters of altitude again.
Then I plunge 250 meters down into the Eyachtal, where the Verker bobs along on the B463 for a long kilometer until I’m allowed to turn left in Lautlingen. Once again, the Integra catapults me up to almost 900m to Albstadt-Onstmettingen.
The subsequent nosedive down to Hausen im Killertal makes you think that the name of the stream of the same name was invented by life-weary motorcyclists.
The route continues along the Albtrauf in cheerful ups and downs. The roads become straighter and you could really take it easy, but the proximity of the conurbations around Reutlingen is noticeable in the volume of traffic. It’s not exactly a traffic jam, but you can’t do more than 80 km/h. That’s not really bad, because the last 100 km were characterized by so much accelerating out of great bends that a little breather doesn’t seem so bad.
In Genkingen (Waypoint 7) I leave the Albrand heading east and after a few kilometers I turn left to the parking lot at Lichtenstein Castle. On a short walk, I enjoy the view from the Hauff monument down into the Echaz valley and have a coffee in the forester’s lodge. I don’t take the guided tour of the castle today, as this is not my first visit here.
But I can really recommend a guided tour of the castle to anyone who wants to do this tour.

Zwiefalten – Sigmaringen
About a kilometer after the turn-off to the castle, we reach the traffic circle (waypoint 11), where we are directed straight onto the B312 to Zwiefalten – if we wanted to. The route would be beautiful, the many trucks on the route easy to overtake, so it would be perfectly rideable. But I would like it to be a bit more lonely and hilly. That’s why I head straight on at Traifelberg via Kohlstetten-Offenhausen (waypoint 12) into the Große Lautertal.
Unfortunately, the Great Lauter Valley is only passable to a limited extent, so just before Marbach I turn left onto the Alb plateau (Waypoint 13). Shortly before Eglingen, I reach another of the scenic high points before descending behind Hayingen (Waypoint 14) into the beautiful valley of the Zwiefalter Aach, past Ehrenfels Castle and the Wimsen Cave.
At weekends, the square in front of Zwiefalter Münster is packed with motorcycles and the café on Münsterplatz is a lively meeting place for bikers. Today the square is deserted, despite the glorious weather.

So I continue on to the hills between Zwiefalten and Langenenslingen. These offer one last bend in the road before I continue on a fairly straight race track through wonderfully colorful forest passages to Hitzkofen.
Shortly after Bingen, past the Stauffenberg barracks, traffic is already reduced to 80 km/h and we reach Sigmaringen, the starting point of this wonderful autumn tour.


