CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
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: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 205 km round trip from Bansko - roughly 4 h 01 in the saddle. It goes by way of \Pchelino Convent\ Complex, Rila Monastery, Rila Monastery Complex and \St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,700 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Bansko lies at the foot of the Pirin Mountains in south-west Bulgaria, at the northern end of the Razlog valley, and the first sight of it is the wall behind: Pirin's jagged limestone peaks, climbing to Vihren at 2,914 metres, the second-highest mountain in the country after Musala. The range is a national park and a UNESCO site, and its high lakes, dwarf pine and rare Bosnian pine hold some of the most unspoiled alpine country in the Balkans. Winter brings snow from December well into spring, and Bansko is one of the busiest ski resorts in Bulgaria, with a gondola that runs from the edge of town.
Read the complete Bansko write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bansko is where the day begins. Next is \Pchelino Convent\ Complex.
The mountains of southwestern Bulgaria are among the wildest in the Balkans, and the area between Rila and Pirin holds a string of small monasteries tucked into forested valleys. During centuries of Ottoman rule these monasteries kept the Bulgarian language, the Orthodox faith and the art of icon painting alive, and the great Rila Monastery, founded in the tenth century around the hermitage of Saint Ivan of Rila, became the national symbol.
Read the complete \Pchelino Convent\ Complex write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
\Pchelino Convent\ Complex comes up about 92 km into the recorded legs. Next is Rila Monastery.
The road to Rila Monastery climbs a long valley through forests of beech and spruce, and when the monastery appears the effect is theatrical. Its walls enclose a courtyard of striped arcades in black, white and red, with a church in the middle covered in frescoes, and behind it the green flanks of the Rila mountains rise towards peaks of more than two and a half thousand metres. It is the largest and most important monastery in Bulgaria, and UNESCO listed it in 1983.
Read the complete Rila Monastery write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
At least about 96 km into the recorded legs you reach Rila Monastery. Next is Rila Monastery Complex.
Rila Monastery sits at around eleven hundred metres in a forested valley of the Rila mountains, the highest range in the Balkans, where Musala at nearly three thousand metres stands above all the peaks of south-eastern Europe. The monastery lies at the end of a long road that follows the Rilska river upstream through beech and spruce, and the approach feels like going back in time. Mist hangs in the trees, the air smells of resin, and the river noise grows louder as you climb.
Read the complete Rila Monastery Complex write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rila Monastery Complex, about halfway. Next is \St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex, 14 km on.
Above Rila Monastery, in the folds of the Rila Mountains, a path leads to the hermit's cave where it all began. The monastery was founded in the tenth century by Saint Ivan of Rila, a monk who left the world to live as a recluse in these forests, and he gathered followers who built a community.
Read the complete \St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
\St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex sits at 55 km, about halfway. Next is back through Rila Monastery Complex.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rila Monastery Complex write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Rila Monastery Complex comes up about 111 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Rila Monastery.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rila Monastery write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 112 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Rila Monastery. Next is back through \Pchelino Convent\ Complex.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete \Pchelino Convent\ Complex write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through \Pchelino Convent\ Complex, late in the day. Next is Bansko.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bansko write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 205 km.
Bansko → \Pchelino Convent\ Complex is 92 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
\Pchelino Convent\ Complex → Rila Monastery is 4 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Rila Monastery Complex → \St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex is 2 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
\St. Luke Hermitage\ Complex → back through Rila Monastery Complex is 12 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Rila Monastery → back through \Pchelino Convent\ Complex is 4 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through \Pchelino Convent\ Complex → Bansko is 92 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.