I have now completed my first long-distance hiking trail (LAW): LAW 6 The Great Rivers trail. This trail goes from west to east in the Netherlands (or vice versa) and passes several major rivers in the Netherlands, such as the Nieuwe Waterweg, Oude Maas, Hollandse IJssel, Lek, Linge and the Waal.
My experience
The entire trail gets an average rating of 3.5 stars from me ⭐⭐⭐✨. There were some boring parts in between, which is unavoidable with a long-distance hiking trail, but also many varied natural areas. I walked through all kinds of hidden gems, such as the Rhoonse Grienden, the Loetbos, the Bolgerijse Griendbossen, Heerlijkheid Mariënwaerdt and the Hemmen estate. You do cover a lot of asphalt, so this is not the best trail for unpaved hikers.
The trail is easy to follow using the red and white markings and the trail booklet. I made a few wrong turns, but that was mainly due to me not paying attention. Tip: do not blindly follow the trail in the booklet, as there may be detours. Sometimes it is better to follow the markings. You can always check the Wandelnet website for trail changes.
Other trail guide about hiking along rivers
In general, the trail is easily accessible by public transport, especially around Rotterdam you can get everywhere easily. Only between Vianen and Leerdam is it a bit more difficult to reach the trail by public transport, and thus this was also the longest stretch for me.
Also striking: both the first (Hoek van Holland – Maassluis) and the last part (Nijmegen – Duivelsberg) were wonderful hikes and thus worth a 5 star rating. I did not make a blog of the first part, but I did dedicate blog posts to all other parts. You will find them in the blog category: Great rivers trail. The most recent blog is located at the top.
Order hikes from Wonderful to Rush back home
Below are all the blog posts about the Great rivers trail in a row from wonderful (5 star rating) to Rush back home (1 star rating).
Wonderful hikes (5 and 4.5 stars) – ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Section 1 Great rivers trail: Hoek van Holland to Maassluis. I don’t have a blog post of this, but I do have the link to the 1st section on the Wandelnet website: Etappe 01 Grote rivierenpad.
Super hikes (4 stars) – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Fine hikes (3 stars) – ⭐⭐⭐
So-so hikes (2 stars) – ⭐⭐
Rush back home hike (1 star) – ⭐
What’s next?
After completing a long-distance hiking trail, I have got the hang of it. I want to hike a lot of long distance trails, the Dutch Coastal trail (LAW5) attracts my attention, but the Border trail (LAW11) also seems very nice. I have also started with the Migration birds trail (LAW2) before, see previous blogs about it, but it doesn’t really progress with only 1 or 2 sections a year.
However, I have chosen another long-distance trail (which is not developed by Wandelnet) called the Zuiderwaterlinie trail (Southern Waterline trail). This is because I moved to Zevenbergen in Noord-Brabant at the end of 2021 and let this trail pass right through my hometown. This is a great introduction to the province I live in. Update: I have now also completed the Southern Waterline trail. You can find the blogs about this trail here.
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