Bike Hire on the lower Rhine in Germany

Because of this blog and our website we regularly receive enquiries from people who wish to hire a bicycle in one town and leave it elsewhere. Unfortunately we often need to reply that if you hire a bike in one town that is where you need to return it.  There were a few exceptions:

• You can hire a bicycle in Passau and drop it off in Vienna. 
• You can hire a bike in Berlin and drop it off in Copenhagen.  

There is now a new series of possibilities. The RadRegionRheinland (Rhineland Cycling Region) has set up Radstation, a series of cycle centres offering bicycle repair, parking and hire.
The Radstation in Bergisch Gladbach, Bonn, Brühl, Köln (Cologne), Grevenbroich, Dormagen, Neuss and Düsseldorf offer the possibilty of hiring in one city and returning to a Radstation elsewhere in the system for an extra charge of between 2 and 8 Euros.

Bike Hire in the Rhine Valley between Ludwigshafen and the border with France on the left bank and between Mannheim and the Black Forest on the right bank.

We have been asked a number of times about hiring a bike at the start of a trip and dropping it off at the end. Although this idea is common enough in the motor car hire industry, it appears to be a concept that is too difficult manage in the bicycle hire industry. Basically if you want to hire a bike choose a circular route like round Lake Constance. Otherwise you will need to return the bikes to your starting point. Having said this there are exceptions:

• Luxembourg, but as the country is only a little bigger than a postage stamp, this is not much of an advantage.
• Rheinhessen between  Mainz and  Worms.
• The Niederrhein Region between Düsseldorf and the Dutch border.
• Switzerland, if you hire a bike for  two days or longer.
• You can hire a bike in Berlin or Copenhagen and drop it off in the other city.

All of the above areas will let you hire a bike in one town and return it to a hirer in another town, but in comparison to hiring a car in Copenhagen and dropping it off in Madrid it's small beer. 

We have found another local company, bellorange® ( www.bellorange.com) that hires bikes in 15 small towns and villages between Ludwigshafen - Mannheim, the French border by Wissembourg and into the northern Black Forest. They offer a wide range of bikes, e-bikes and tandems. The website is only in German, but it features an interactive map which makes it very easy to use. This is odd because the company has a brochure in German, English, French and Spanish.

Bicycle Rental in and around Düsseldorf

Düsseldorf is the provincial capital of Nordrhein-Westfalen in north-western Germany. The city is a paradise for shoppers on the Kö, beer drinkers in the Altstadt (old city centre) with the longest bar in the world and good links into the Niederrhein area which like the Netherlands is ideal for cycling. It has an airport, good train connections with the rest of Germany and Europe and is a good place to start and/or finish a cycling holiday. As ever with the exception of the Nextbike system it is better to book ahead to avoid disappointment.

Nextbike offers a number of bicycle rental stations with standardised urban utility bikes on a 24 hour basis using mobile phones to log in. These bikes, similar to the schemes in London and Paris, are not intended as touring bikes, but as flexible addition to public transport. The website is in English but flips into German when you start to look at individual German cities. Google Translator solves that problem easily.

Unfortunately the excellent Niederrheinrad bike hire network does not have any hire stations within the city boundaries, though there are two hire stations in Neuss across the Rhine: 

• Hotel Ibis Düsseldorf/Neuss. (Take a train to Neuss Hauptbahnhof (Main Station) and take a taxi.)
• Hotel Fire and Ice, out of town by the all year round ski hall. (Take the S-Bahn to Neuss Hbf (Neuss central station). Leave Neuss Hbf through the exit “Further Straße” and follow the sign to “Bahnsteig Nr. 1” Take bus 843 toward “Grefrath” and get off at “Skihalle” after a ride of approx. 25 minutes.)

Fahrradverleih Price Düsseldorf, Duesseldorfer Str. 36, 40545 Duesseldorf, phone: +49-211- 5590635, mobile +49-1520 - 4697087, approx. 100 m / 320 ft from youth hostel, Bus 835 836 to bus stop Jugendherberge, Opening times: Mo.-Su. 9:00 - 11:00 and 16:30 - 18:30, Rates: € 10.00 per day ; € 40.00 per week

Zukunftswerkstatt Düsseldorf (ZWD) – Services for cyclists

The workshop, a training establishment for the long term unemployed, offers repair services, restored bicycles and second hand parts. It rents out 20 – 28" bicycles, helmets and children's seats. You can also leave your bike here in safety while you look at the city. There is room for 450 bikes. 

Radstation der Zukunftswerkstatt Düsseldorf
Willi-Becker-Allee 8 a, direkt behind the  Hauptbahnhof (Central railway station), 40227 Düsseldorf, Tel.: +49 (0)211/5 14 47 11, www.zwd.de/zwd/zweiradwerkstatt

Prices

Rental: €10 daily. Parking 70 cents a day. 

Sport-Freizeit-Center Cremers Fahrradverleih

Sport-Freizeit-Center Niederkassel is on the Rhine bank. You can hire 7 gear (hub)touring bikes, either for men, women or children.

Am Pappelwäldchen 92
40547 Düsseldorf
Tel.: +49 (0)211/57 26 00

Underground U70, U74, U75, U76, U77 to Luegplatz
Bus 834 to Niederkassel; 833 to Johannsenstraße
Prices

Komfort-Bike 2 hours: €6, 1 day €11, weekly: €49

Opening Times: March to the End of October. Mo 1 am to 8:30 pm, Tu to Fri 11 am to 8:30 pm, Weekends and public holidays: 10:30 am to 8:30 pm