During an uninviting grey day, when everything in the world already looked like it was black and white, Erwin Sikkens grabbed his camera and got on his gravel bike. His goal was to check out an unjustly overlooked place, taking in the diverse nature in the north of the Dutch cycling province of Limburg.
The thing with hidden gems is, you might want to keep them to yourself so nobody else knows about them. However, that’s not in my nature and come to think of it, not what gravel cycling is about. From the moment we first got on our gravel bikes, we’ve been discovering beautiful places and was it not for people telling others about it, our gravel community might not have been what it is today. Therefore, when I see people overlooking an area of great beauty right in front of their noses, I’m always eager to tell them about what they’ve been missing out on. One such area is the North of Limburg.
The north of Limburg is known as a typical cycling province, but also as one that’s quite far away. People travelling all the way to our southernmost point of the southernmost province of The Netherlands, often turn it into a weekender, but they need not do so. Just around the corner, by the side of the river Maas, I already follow twisting and turning gravel roads hidden in between hedges in the ultimate north of the province. With gravel riding being so popular and the amazing gravel roads we find here to ride, you would expect at least some other people. But we’ve got the place all to ourselves. We keep riding and enjoying the many contrasts as well as the many twists and turns.
We cross the river onto empty farm roads, leading us towards a forest in the distance. National Park Maasduinen first. The German Reichswald next. Wherever we go, nobody is around. I enjoy the silence as much as I want to tell people about this place. When we enter the forest, the ground is covered with fallen leaves. Still, the gravel underneath is hardpacked and the riding amazing. We exchange flat meadows for hills. They also offer perfect riding, slower uphill, faster down the other side.
The mud covering our bikes at the end of the ride is a silent witness of our adventure. We could have ridden our bikes here all day, but we’ll have to come back and discover this area some more. There’s much more to this gem than you could ever see in a day.
The North Limburg, just around the corner, yet so unknown.
See you again soon.
If you would like to find out more about the gravel riding opportunities, you can head to the Land of Sand & Grit website, an amazing resource for everything gravelly in the north of Limburg.