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Just over 500 kilometres in length, the route from Prague to Magdeburg offers a great mix of impressions and experiences, taking you though a change of landscapes, cultures and historic highlights – all in an easy-to-reach part of central Europe. A perfect blend of adventure, relaxed cycling, natural landscapes and a cultural and historic journey of great interest await you: Two great cultural capitals - Prague and Dresden, charming Bohemian and Saxon towns, palaces and castles, porcelain from Meissen, the Saxon Wine Road, Martin Luther’s city Wittenberg, the Elbe’s wide flood-plains and, as a concluding highlight, the old city of Magdeburg.

In ancient times the Danube bordered the Roman Empire, later the river was the lifeline of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until the Iron Curtain separated countries and ended the economic and cultural connection of the countries till 1989. The changeful history of the countries at the Danube cycle route between Vienna and Bratislava cannot only be seen in cities like Bratislava, Györ or Esztergom, but also right next to the route at the roman excavations at Petronell-Carnuntum. The cycling tourist can look forward to excellent cycling paths on the dykes that line the Danube which leads him through its floodplains. Not less scenic is the Danube’s Bend near Visegrád where the river turns south and is headed to Hungarian capital city, Budapest.

To properly live, breathe and experience history - that is the goal of the Iron Curtain Trail. From the Barents Sea to the Black Sea, this guide takes you along the Western border of the old Warsaw Pact countries, all the way across Europe. The route does not just connect European culture, history and sustainable tourism but it also provides historically interested cyclists with some spectacularly beautiful and varied landscapes and unique habitats that were able to emerge in the former border strip, which is today the European Green Belt. The maps in the revised edition are scaled larger at 1:120,000 from Helsinki to Riga, and from Grense Jakobselv to Vaalimaa it remains at 1:400,000. This volume describes the 4,000-kilometre-long part of the route from the Barents Sea to Riga. Bei der überarbeiteten Neuauflage wird laminiertes Papier benutzt und die Karten bekommen andere Maßstäbe. Deshalb wird es statt drei nun fünf Bücher geben. Dieser erste Band dokumentiert den fast 4.000 Kilometer langen nördlichen Teil der Route von Grense Jakobselv an der norwegisch-russischen Grenze bis zur lettischen Hauptstadt Riga. Dabei radelt man von den beeindruckenden Weiten Norwegens und Finnlands über den russischen, estnischen und lettischen Teil vom Ostseeküsten-Radweg nach Riga, wobei der Abschnitt ab Helsiniki ebenfalls integriert wurde.