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.
264 km from Konstanz to Konstanz, about 5 h 01 of riding. The stops in between: Sipplingen-Osthafen, Wangen-Hinterhorn, Bodman-Schachen / Löchle and Insel Werd. It crosses from Switzerland into Germany - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 36 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Konstanz sits right where the Rhine leaves Lake Constance, and so close to Switzerland that Kreuzlingen's streets seem to flow into its own. The border runs through the built-up area with only a fence in places, and because the Germans built the old centre on the northern bank and the Swiss on the south, the two towns are practically one. This closeness is the first thing to know. The second is that the old city was never bombed in the Second World War, spared partly because of its position next to a neutral country, and as a result the medieval streets and merchants' houses survive intact.
Read the complete Konstanz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Konstanz is where the day begins. Next is Sipplingen-Osthafen.
At Sipplingen the north shore of Lake Constance changes character. The Überlinger See, the long north-western arm of the lake, is hemmed in here by steep molasse cliffs and wooded slopes rising to the Sipplinger Berg, and the village sits on a narrow strip between the hill and the water. Below the surface off the eastern harbour lie the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, villages of wooden houses built on stilts along the shore some five to six thousand years ago. They are part of the World Heritage site of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps.
Read the complete Sipplingen-Osthafen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sipplingen-Osthafen comes up about 36 km into the recorded legs. Next is Wangen-Hinterhorn.
When the water of the Untersee, the western arm of Lake Constance, was unusually low in the winter of 1853 to 1854, people around the Swiss and German shores noticed wooden posts sticking out of the mud. They were the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, villages built on the lakeshore thousands of years ago, and the find sparked a wave of research and a craze for lake-dwelling romance across Europe. Wangen, on the German shore of the Untersee, was one of the first sites studied, and Wangen-Hinterhorn belongs to the World Heritage inscription for prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, though there is nothing to see above the water.
Read the complete Wangen-Hinterhorn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 71 km into the recorded legs you reach Wangen-Hinterhorn. Next is Bodman-Schachen / Löchle.
Lake Constance takes its German name, Bodensee, from this village. Bodman, at the western tip of the Überlinger See arm of the lake, was the site of a royal palace in the early Middle Ages, and the name of the place spread to the water. Below the village, in the shallows at Schachen and Löchle, lie the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, part of the transnational World Heritage Site of Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, inscribed in 2011.
Read the complete Bodman-Schachen / Löchle write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bodman-Schachen / Löchle, about halfway. Next is Insel Werd.
Where the Rhine leaves Lake Constance at Stein am Rhein, a group of small islands sits in the river, connected to the shore by a wooden footbridge, and on the largest, Werd, stands a small chapel surrounded by trees and water. It was here, in 759, that Saint Otmar, the first abbot of St Gallen, died in exile after falling foul of powerful local nobles, and the island has been a place of pilgrimage ever since. Long before Otmar, people lived here too: the islands and the surrounding shores are among the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, a World Heritage site, and excavations have found traces of settlements from the Neolithic onwards.
Read the complete Insel Werd write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Insel Werd sits at 102 km, about halfway. Next is back through Bodman-Schachen / Löchle.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bodman-Schachen / Löchle write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Bodman-Schachen / Löchle comes up about 164 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Wangen-Hinterhorn.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Wangen-Hinterhorn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 193 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Wangen-Hinterhorn. Next is back through Sipplingen-Osthafen.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sipplingen-Osthafen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Sipplingen-Osthafen, late in the day. Next is Konstanz.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Konstanz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 264 km.
Konstanz → Sipplingen-Osthafen is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sipplingen-Osthafen → Wangen-Hinterhorn is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Wangen-Hinterhorn → Bodman-Schachen / Löchle is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Bodman-Schachen / Löchle → Insel Werd is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Insel Werd → back through Bodman-Schachen / Löchle is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Bodman-Schachen / Löchle → back through Wangen-Hinterhorn is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Wangen-Hinterhorn → back through Sipplingen-Osthafen is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sipplingen-Osthafen → Konstanz is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.