Discover Hilden: Forest, Trails and History

Hilden offers several different ways to experience the town during a stay: its expansive mixed forest, historic traces in the town centre, and attractions related to art, medicine and exercise. You can give nature, local history and leisure activities different levels of focus, depending on your interests. This choice can be helpful when planning days together with different priorities, especially when travelling with children.

Urban Forest and Nature

Hilden’s urban forest covers around 430 hectares and is a mixed forest. Around 20 percent of its area consists of nature reserves; the rest of the forest is designated as a landscape conservation area. This means that two different protection categories lie within the forest.

The Sandberg is home to dry heathland, while the area around Schönholz features heathland and moorland. Rare plant and animal species can be found there; which species you can observe may vary by season. Alongside its woodland, these named landscape areas give the urban forest additional nature-related attractions.

The urban forest has 30 kilometres of trails for hiking, walking your dog, cycling or jogging. This lets you combine the forest with different activities rather than viewing it merely as a backdrop for a single outing.

Hilden’s History and Culture

The Hilden town centre tour is about 2.8 kilometres long and is suitable for pedestrians and cyclists alike. It introduces visible traces from the Middle Ages, the Reformation, the industrial age and the 20th century, taking you on a historical journey through several eras.

Hilden’s Reformation Church dates back to the 13th century and is one of the town’s few historic buildings. To explore Hilden’s history, you can choose between the church’s long past and the range of eras covered by the town centre tour.

The Wilhelm Fabry Museum hosts changing exhibitions on art and medicine. The museum also includes the Vogelsang distillery, a site of industrial heritage with a steam engine installed in 1887. Here, changing exhibition themes sit alongside a tangible industrial connection.

Swimming Pools and Trails in the Region

The swimming pools also offer different features. Alongside its sports and leisure facilities, Hildorado has a sauna area. Waldbad is located on the edge of Hilden’s urban forest and has sports, non-swimmer and diving pools. If you plan to visit one of the pools, check the latest facilities before your trip, as they may change.

Stages 11 and 12 of the neanderland STEIG pass by Hilden and offer views of Menzelsee and Elbsee. Routes and conditions may change, so check the latest route information before setting out on a stage. In the wider travel destination of Mettmann, the almost 240-kilometre neanderland STEIG long-distance hiking trail circles the entire district in 17 stages. Hilden is in neanderland, between Düsseldorf, Wuppertal and Cologne.

When travelling with children, you can choose activities according to everyone’s interests: forest trails, a historical walking tour or a visit to one of the swimming pools are different ideas for spending time together. Your choice will depend on which experiences matter most to you during your stay in Hilden.

More Destinations

Discover more destinations: Monheim am Rhein, Heiligenhaus, Ratingen, Velbert, Erkrath, Langenfeld, Mettmann, Haan.

For the main travel overview: Mettmann.