Leichlingen (Rhld.) – Orchard Trail, Wupper and Sinneswald
Accommodation in Leichlingen
Leichlingen (Rhld.) combines routes through the countryside with art venues and historic buildings. The town offers a range of options for planning your trip: the Orchard Trail focuses on the landscape, the DachsDuoTour passes through natural areas, and Sinneswald combines sculptures with distinctive settings. When looking for a holiday apartment, you can decide whether you want to focus mainly on nature experiences in Leichlingen or include destinations elsewhere in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis in your plans.
Hiking between the Orchard Trail and the valleys
The Leichlingen Orchard Trail is a circular route of about 9 kilometres through the town’s countryside. A local diversion due to storm damage is indicated for the route; check the current route before setting off. At 8.1 kilometres, the DachsDuoTour is a similar length, but has a different focus: visitors can explore Leichlingen’s natural areas and their distinctive animals and plants.
The route initially follows the banks of the Wupper for a short stretch, then heads up the valley into the Weltersbach valley and returns to the Wupper through the Murbach valley. At 24 stops, information signs and QR codes link to information pages. This allows you to explore the tour not only through its landscapes, but also through its stops and the information they provide. Compared with the Orchard Trail, the valleys described and the stops along the DachsDuoTour offer particularly specific points of reference when choosing a route: the distances are similar, but the themes differ.
When looking for accommodation, these interests can help you decide: should your stay focus mainly on Leichlingen’s routes and art venues, or would you also like to include other places in the district? The tours described make nature the main focus, without requiring you to miss out on cultural discoveries in the town.
Art and history in Leichlingen
In the Murbach valley, Sinneswald displays sculptures by artists from the region on the grounds of a historic spinning mill. Artworks can be found around an old millpond, on paths through quarries and woods, and along a stream. Exhibitions have been held there since 1993, with a different theme each year. The changing themes are therefore as much a part of the art venue as the varied landscapes where the artworks can be discovered.
Leichlingen’s Protestant church also provides a historic highlight: it is the town’s oldest sacred architectural monument. Nearby, between Leichlingen and Solingen on the Wupper in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis, is Wipperkotten. Built around 1600 as a grinding mill, it is the last double mill complex of its kind on the lower Wupper. It houses a collection of historic, hand-crafted tools and equipment from mills in the Bergisches Land. Check the current arrangements for visits before travelling there.
Leichlingen in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis
The Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis lies at the meeting point of the greater Cologne area and the scenic Bergisches Land. Rail-based public transport is available in Leichlingen, Bergisch Gladbach, Rösrath and Overath, with connections towards Cologne. Check the relevant timetables for your planned destinations.
Other cultural destinations in the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis offer different highlights. At the LVR Industrial Museum Papiermühle Alte Dombach in Bergisch Gladbach, visitors can explore historic papermaking machines, make a sheet of paper themselves and see a laboratory paper machine in operation. A paper festival is held there every year in May or June. The Kunstmuseum Villa Zanders in Bergisch Gladbach has around 1,000 square metres of exhibition space across three floors; its collection includes about 500 works of paper art by around 150 international artists. The history of papermaking at Alte Dombach and the collection at Villa Zanders thus offer two different ways to explore art and paper as a material in the broader destination of the Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis.
Discover more destinations: Bergisch Gladbach, Wermelskirchen, Odenthal, Burscheid, Overath, Kürten, Rösrath.
Return to the main travel overview: Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis.
