The Offenbütteler Moor and the cycling routes along the Kiel Canal give Offenbüttel two distinct travel highlights: rewetted moorland and cycling paths. When planning your stay, you can first decide whether the landscape itself or a specific route should take centre stage.
The Offenbütteler Moor and Its Habitats
The Offenbütteler Moor is a former raised bog covering around 400 hectares, bordered by the Gieselau and the Kiel Canal. Former grassland areas and land acquired for nature conservation have been extensively rewetted since 2013. This created habitats for plants and animals typical of moorland. Specialist plants include peat mosses, marsh calla and cottongrass. Bird species that have found a habitat there include cranes, snipes, skylarks, meadow pipits, and whinchats and stonechats. Two platforms have been built in the restored moor.
Moorland Tours, Carriage Rides and Farm Café
Moorland tours last about three hours. A carriage ride and walking excursion includes a guided explanation of the moor and a short walk into it. Carriage rides through the moor are offered regularly in summer. Check the availability of tours and seasonal carriage rides before your trip.
Thode’s farm café serves homemade tarts and cakes, as well as ice cream sundaes, cream puffs and waffles. A carriage ride through the Offenbütteler Moor begins with coffee together at Thode farm café. Guests on the moor excursion also receive small dishes featuring local wild herbs. So, alongside the landscape, the farm café’s offerings and the culinary elements of the excursion are also worth exploring.
Cycling Routes along the Kiel Canal
The Kiel Canal Cycle Route passes directly through Offenbüttel. A signed diversion on the canal route goes via Offenbüttel, Dammsknöll, the pumping station and the Gieselau Canal. In the regional corridor along the Kiel Canal, cycling, walking, hiking and horse riding are possible on the service roads beside the canal. One promoted circular tour runs from Albersdorf via the Offenbütteler Moor and Schafstedt and back to Albersdorf. The Amt Mitteldithmarschen also provides three ready-made cycle tours that you can follow using GPS on your phone.
The route descriptions offer different options: a cycle route through Offenbüttel, a signed diversion, a circular tour starting and ending in Albersdorf, or GPS-guided route planning. Check current route conditions before setting off.
More Things to See in the Dithmarschen Destination
The Dithmarschen destination has other independent attractions, each with a different focus. The Dithmarscher Landesmuseum in Meldorf takes you through 1,200 years of Dithmarschen, from the wealth of the peasant republic to rural everyday life in the 1960s. At the Stone Age Park Dithmarschen, hands-on activities such as flint knapping, archery, making Stone Age jewellery, fire making and bread baking are part of the programme; activities may vary depending on the schedule.
The Stone Age Forest next to the Stone Age Park covers around 40 hectares of natural outdoor grounds, which are permanently and freely accessible, and includes nine original archaeological monuments. Check access information before visiting. Guided mudflat walks along the Dithmarschen coast are led by National Park mudflat guides with local knowledge and expertise. At low tide, they reveal the diverse life of the Wadden Sea; tides and dates of guided tours vary.
Discover more destinations: Bargenstedt, Nindorf, Pahlen, Burg, Hörst, Hägen, Elpersbüttel, Büsumer Deichhausen.
Go to the main travel overview: Dithmarschen.
