Szczecin Lagoon Cycle Route - Stage IV [Świnoujście/Ahlbeck – Anklam]

Stage IV: Świnoujście/Ahlbeck - Anklam [54 km]

The route leads along bicycle paths and local roads with little traffic. Almost the entire section runs on asphalt surfaces, rarely concrete blocks. Moreover, it is possible to shorten the route by the Kamp - Karnin bicycle ferry.

Marking of the trail: good, common to the trail Oder-Neiße-Radweg (D-12), signs of the Stettiner Haff-Rundweg appear sporadically.

Świnoujście offers a wide range of attractions, which we also mention in the descriptions of the Velo Baltica and Blue Velo trails. The city, located on 44 islands, has numerous military attractions - a souvenir of the times when its port was protected as a fortress. Fort Gerhard on Usedom island was a part of it. It's one of the best-preserved 19th-century Prussian coastal forts in Europe. Right next to it stands the tallest lighthouse in Poland. It is also the tallest brick building of this type in the world, so it is worth climbing to the top to see the view of the city, forts and ferries from Sweden entering the port. You can't miss the expanding gas port - a pillar of Poland's energy security. On the other side of Świna you can see another part of the fortress, Angel's Fort, and a few steps further - Western Fort. The most picturesque attraction of the city is Stawa Młyny, a navigation facility with a fanciful shape of a windmill. This is one of the most photographed places on the Polish coast. From here, you can take the Promenade of Health, and then cycle through the forest to the symbolic gate on the border with Germany.

Passing the gate to Germany, we can continue our journey on a comfortable walking and cycling path through the forest, which will lead us straight to the pier in Ahlbeck. It is worth making a few kilometers more to see the next two of the three Imperial Resorts: Ahlbeck, Heringsdorf and Bansin with beautiful buildings from the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Even if somehow you wouldn’t notice the border, you will immediately realize that you are no longer in Poland. Anklam is so much different from Polish resorts. If we stick to the trail, after less than 20 kilometers of cycling through the hilly terrain, we pass the DDR Museum Dargen / Usedom. An impressive collection of exhibits from the times of The German Democratic Republic has been gathered here, including numerous cars, buses, and agricultural machinery.

You could say that we are now on the technology trail because the next museum on the route is "Traktoren Welt", or "The World of Tractors". The name is enough for a description. After Usedom we go to what is probably the most spectacular technical monument on the Lagoon, and certainly on the German side. The huge drawbridge of the former railway stands alone in the middle of the strait. Until the end of World War II, it was part of the bridge on the Berlin-Świnoujście route, blown up by the Wehrmacht in the last days of the war. Soviet troops provisionally rebuilt the bridge to use the railroad to transport valuable goods to the USSR. Later the unused line fell into degradation, and only the middle span remained from the great construction, permanently raised up to a height of 28 meters. There are ideas to rebuild the line, which would mean that a new bridge would be built nearby, but it won't be anytime soon. The object can be viewed up close only from the water - and there is a way to do it. You can take the ferry to Kamp, thus saving 33 kilometers of the trail. The crossing takes 10 minutes and was created with cyclists in mind. It operates till 17 October from 10 to 17.

If you're late for the ferry we've got good news - there's a fantastic section ahead of you! We leave Uznam (Usedom) island by Zecheriner Brücke - a drawbridge from 1931. Then, the bicycle path runs along the road, passing mysterious, flooded forest, which can be viewed from a comfortable observation tower. There's a lot of birds of various species here.