With flat and wide roads as well as dedicated cycling lanes on the roads, cycling in Berlin, Germany’s capital city, is a popular form of commuting, amongst the locals there. 

This is also aided by the fact that there are many rental bikes spread across the city too. These are owned by various bike sharing companies such as MoBike. So it is easy to commute via bike, even if you do not own a bicycle.

In fact, cycling around Berlin is so popular too, that there are several tour groups which arrange cycling tours – for tourists to see the city on two wheels.

Booking my bike tour

As I also enjoy cycling in addition to running, I decided to book myself on a leisurely Berlin Bike Tour too, in order to experience the city on two wheels.

But since there are so many tours around, which one would be the best bike tour to pick, though? 

To come to a decision, I had looked at the reviews on TripAdvisor and decided on a Berlin City Bike Tour with Fat Tire Tours. This tour is probably one of the best bike tours in the city, as the organisers have been around for more than ten years, so I had figured that it would be quite safe to book with them. 

Additionally, the TripAdvisor reviews were also largely positive as well – amongst both locals and tourists alike.

Fat Tire’s Berlin City Bike Tour will set you back by 32 euros. And to accommodate different people’s schedules, they have two sessions every day – one at 11am in the morning and the other at 3.30pm in the afternoon. Each tour lasts about 4.5 hours – but with a meal break in between.

Meeting the tour guide

And the tour meeting point had been the entrance to the television tower at Alexanderplatz which is an iconic location in the city and rather hard to miss. 

So this meant that I had no trouble with finding the place even though it was my first time in Berlin and I was not familiar with the city at all.

A good first impression 

I had a good impression right from the beginning. There were more than 30 people in my tour group, so the organiser decided to split us into two smaller groups to make things easier to manage. They then shared a little bit about themselves and then it came to choosing our bikes.

And when I saw the bikes, I really liked the little touches that the organisers had added, in terms of naming the bikes after various elements of pop culture – for instance, the bike I chose had been named Ghostbusters, after the movie of the same name.

Before leaving, our tour guide also mentioned that because of the Berlin Marathon the following day, there were road closures around the city, so they would not be able to bring us along the same route that they usually took. But he still stressed that we would still get the chance to see all of the main attractions.

We are off

Then after a quick bike fit to adjust our bikes to match our heights, we were off.

It was quite easy to ride our bikes around Berlin and they were quite responsive, though I would admit that I needed to take some time to get used to my bike, because I am more accustomed to my road bike rather than a lifestyle bike – which had been what we were using for the tour. 

Relaxed pace

Fortunately though, the pace that we were moving at had been very relaxed, so it was not too hard on my legs, and I had no trouble in terms of keeping up with the group as a result.

There were several occasions too when we had to stop and start our bikes, in order to cross traffic lights and so on, which was a bit disruptive to my cycling rhythm, but I suppose that this can’t be helped, as cyclists also need to obey the traffic rules.

Sights of Berlin

The sights that we saw had included the Fernsehturm Berlin, the Berlin Cathedral and the surrounding Lustgarten, the Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, the Berlin Victory Column and the Soviet War Memorial Tiergarten.

These locations are all quite some distance apart, so going on a bike tour is generally the best way for most people to see all of them within a short time – and perhaps also to help you decide which attraction you want to go back to and spend more time at.

At each stop, the tour guide also explained the history behind the places to us, and I thought that this was quite fascinating. 

While I think that it is one thing to go and see the sights for ourselves, it is also good to understand the stories behind these attractions as it gives a  much greater depth and meaning when you see them – and a tour is typically the best way for you to get this.

While I do know a little bit about Germany’s history, thanks to my school history lessons. Going on the tour made me realise though, that my history books had barely scratched the surface of for example, the Second World War and the events that had lead to Adolf Hitler’s rise to power.

I would say that the tour guides definitely know their stuff, and they were also able to answer some pretty hard questions that were fielded by some of those who were on the tour with me. 

Seeing the Berlin Marathon Inline Skaters in action 

Along the way, we also got to see the Berlin Marathon Inline Skating competition taking place. 

This event, which traditionally takes place the day before the Marathon, had featured roughly about 6,000 skaters rollerblading the 42.195km Berlin Marathon route, with the fastest skaters completing their ride in about an hour. It looked pretty cool but is probably not something that I will do anytime soon, as I had never learned how to roller blade.

Stopping for Dinner

Our dinner stop was at Tiergarten where we had the chance to indulge in some German food and beer while chit-chatting with the others who were on the bike tour too. 

Not wanting to eat such a heavy meal, I tried out the BBQ sausages in a hotdog bun and these turned out to be really tasty and delicious.

During our dinner break, it was also quite thoughtful of the tour guide to provide blankets for us, just in case we were feeling the cold. I thought that this had been a good move on their part.

End of the Tour

The tour finished back at Alexanderplatz where we had started and after it was over, the guide also gave us a brief run-down of the tour and summarised everything before calling it a day. We ended the tour just as it was beginning to grow dark.

A Pleasant Experience 

Overall I would say that the experience I’d had with the Bike Tour had been a pleasant one. 

In all, we had covered about 14km of cycling around Berlin at a leisurely pace, so as long as you are able to ride a bike, it should be quite easy and with the constant stops along the way too, you do not really need to be super fit in order to get through the bike tour.

One word of caution, though: Just don’t do the tour the day before a marathon.