Why this ride
A real weekend escape from the flat city grid. 1208 km round from Azul - plan on about 20 h 50 of riding. The stops in between: Sierra de la Ventana, Cerro Ventana view and Tornquist hills. It keeps to quiet secondary roads.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Buenos Aires · Sierra de la Ventana Weekend
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 1208 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 20 h 50
- Journey
- Loop
Distance and timing basis
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Azul fuel
Azul is a quiet city of fifty-four thousand on the open pampas of Buenos Aires province, about three hundred kilometres south-west of the capital, and it begins with a fort. In 1832 a frontier outpost was built on the banks of the Arroyo Azul, the Blue Stream, to guard settlers against raids and to push the line of European settlement farther into the plains. The town grew around it, and the grid of streets, wide plazas and low houses still has a frontier feel.
Read the complete Azul fuel write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Next is Sierra de la Ventana.
2. Sierra de la Ventana
The Sierra de la Ventana is a surprise in the middle of the pampas. After hundreds of kilometres of flat grassland, cattle and wind, the horizon in the south-west of Buenos Aires province lifts into a chain of folded quartzite ridges, the Sierras Australes, that rise to just over a thousand metres, grey and bare on top, and green with streams and groves of poplar below. The range is named for a natural window, the ventana, a gap in the crest of Cerro de la Ventana that frames the sky, and a steep path up the mountain leads to it for those who like walking.
Read the complete Sierra de la Ventana write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Sierra de la Ventana comes up about 527 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cerro Ventana view.
3. Cerro Ventana view
The Pampas are famously flat, which is why the Sierra de la Ventana looks so improbable, a long wall of quartzite ridges erupting from the grassland in the south of Buenos Aires province. Cerro de la Ventana is the one with the hole in it. Near the crest, at a little over a thousand metres, erosion has punched a natural window through the rock, and on a clear day from the plain you can see the sky through it like a small bright coin. The trail to it takes a few hours of steady uphill walking, and it is a rite of passage for people from Bahía Blanca and the capital.
Read the complete Cerro Ventana view write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 559 km into the recorded legs you reach Cerro Ventana view. Next is Tornquist hills.
4. Tornquist hills
West of the Cerro de la Ventana, the hills crowd in around the town of Tornquist and its provincial park, and the country becomes more rugged and more varied. Ernesto Tornquist, a banker and landowner of the late nineteenth century, owned these lands, and the park that bears his name protects a stretch of the Sierras Australes with some of the best walking in the province. Cerro Tres Picos, the highest summit in Buenos Aires province at about 1,239 metres, is nearby, and the surrounding hills carry names like Napostá Grande and Bonete.
Read the complete Tornquist hills write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Tornquist hills, late in the day. Next is Back to Azul fuel.
5. Back to Azul fuel
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Azul fuel write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at Back to Azul fuel. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
Sierra de la Ventana to Cerro Ventana view
This Sierra de la Ventana → Cerro Ventana view stretch is for rhythm and scenery. Keep your head up, let the view breathe, and resist turning every open bend into a target. Stop once properly rather than half-stopping everywhere.
Tornquist hills to Back to Azul fuel
Use Tornquist hills → Back to Azul fuel as clean positioning. Keep it tidy, ignore impatient traffic and save the enthusiasm for the good road ahead. The value here is not drama; it is arriving at the riding section with space, fuel and concentration intact.