Why this ride
From Málaga it runs 150 km to Málaga; allow about 2 h 59 of riding. On the way it passes El Torcal de Antequera, Antequera Dolmens Site, The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen and Tholos of El Romeral.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Málaga afternoon · Tholos of El Romeral
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 150 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 2 h 59
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
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: 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.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Málaga
Málaga has been a port for nearly three thousand years, founded by the Phoenicians and later ruled by Romans, Moors and Castilians, and the layers show if you look. At the foot of the hill, a Roman theatre lies right next to the Alcazaba, an eleventh-century Moorish fortress-palace whose gardens and fountains climb the slope. Above it a ruined castle called Gibralfaro crowns the summit, linked by a walled path, and the view from its ramparts over the harbour, the bullring and the blue Mediterranean is the best in the city. The painter Pablo Picasso was born here in 1881, and a museum in a Renaissance palace in the old town holds a large collection of his work.
Read the complete Malaga write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Málaga is where the day begins. Next is El Torcal de Antequera.
2. El Torcal de Antequera
El Torcal looks like a city that someone has abandoned to the weather. Great stacks of grey limestone, worn into the shapes of piled plates, mushrooms and heads, rise from a bare plateau high above Antequera, and the whole thing was once seabed. The rock is Jurassic, laid down under warm water around 150 million years ago, then lifted and eaten away by rain and frost until the layered beds were cut into this extraordinary maze. It is a karst landscape, one of the finest in Europe, and part of the Antequera World Heritage listing.
Read the complete El Torcal de Antequera write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
El Torcal de Antequera comes up about 52 km into the recorded legs. Next is Antequera Dolmens Site.
3. Antequera Dolmens Site
A visitor's centre, some car parks, a long low mound and a view across a plain of wheat: the Antequera dolmens site does not look like much from the approach road, and then you step inside Menga and your sense of proportion rearranges itself. This stop is the formal gateway to the complex, a mile or so from the old town, and from here you can see the shape of the landscape that the prehistoric builders chose, with the strange rocky mountain called the Peña de los Enamorados rising to the northeast.
Read the complete Antequera Dolmens Site write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
At least about 70 km into the recorded legs you reach Antequera Dolmens Site. Next is The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen.
4. The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen
Antequera sits in the middle of Andalusia like a coin in a pocket, and the two great dolmens stand on its northern edge, barely more than a kilometre from the centre. Menga and Viera were built more than five thousand years ago by farming people who dragged enormous blocks of stone into place, and Menga is one of the biggest megalithic chambers in Europe, with a roof of slabs that weigh many tonnes each. You walk into a long corridor of stone, with a mound of earth above, and the scale of it hits you before any explanation does.
Read the complete The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen, about halfway. Next is Tholos of El Romeral.
5. Tholos of El Romeral
Just outside Antequera, a low grassy mound hides one of Europe's more unusual prehistoric chambers. The Tholos of El Romeral is a Bronze Age burial, roughly four thousand years old, built from carefully fitted stone slabs that rise in a corbelled dome above a long entrance corridor. Unlike its neighbours, the huge Neolithic dolmens of Menga and Viera, it uses a dry-stone technique closer to what you find in the eastern Mediterranean, so archaeologists argue about where the builders learned it. All three belong to the Antequera Dolmens Site, listed by UNESCO in 2016 partly because the landscape itself seems to be part of the design.
Read the complete Tholos of El Romeral write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Tholos of El Romeral sits at 52 km, about halfway. Next is back through The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen.
6. back through The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through The Menga Dolmen and The Viera Dolmen comes up about 79 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Antequera Dolmens Site.
7. back through Antequera Dolmens Site
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Antequera Dolmens Site write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 80 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Antequera Dolmens Site. Next is back through El Torcal de Antequera.
8. back through El Torcal de Antequera
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete El Torcal de Antequera write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through El Torcal de Antequera, late in the day. Next is Malaga.
9. Málaga
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Malaga write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The route ends here after 150 km.
Leg by leg
Málaga to El Torcal de Antequera
Málaga → El Torcal de Antequera is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
El Torcal de Antequera to Antequera Dolmens Site
El Torcal de Antequera → Antequera Dolmens Site is 18 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Antequera Dolmens Site to back through El Torcal de Antequera
back through Antequera Dolmens Site → back through El Torcal de Antequera is 15 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through El Torcal de Antequera to Malaga
back through El Torcal de Antequera → Malaga is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
More motorcycle rides nearby
- Málaga day out · La Peña de los Enamorados · 138 km
- Ronda day out · Tholos of El Romeral · 248 km
- Grazalema and Zahara Loop · 84 km