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.
From Puebla it runs 347 km to Puebla; allow about 5 h 30 of riding. The stops in between: Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael, Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew, Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C and Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 2,850 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Puebla looks like an old Spanish painting that someone left in the sun. The colonial city, founded in 1531 on a plateau in central Mexico, has a historic centre of more than two thousand buildings covered in glazed tiles, baroque carving and bright paint, and UNESCO listed it in 1987. The street plan is a tidy grid around a large main square, the Zócalo, with a cathedral whose towers are among the tallest in the country. The ceramics called Talavera, white and blue earthenware painted with flowers, decorate churches, kitchens and fountains, and workshops in the city still make them by hand.
Read the complete Puebla write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Puebla is where the day begins. Next is Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael.
Behind a crenellated wall in the middle of Huejotzingo lies one of the earliest Christian buildings in the Americas: the Franciscan convent of San Miguel Arcángel, built in the decades after the Spanish conquest on the lower slopes of the volcanoes west of Puebla. The friars arrived here within a few years of the fall of Tenochtitlan, and the church, convent and walled atrium they raised are a textbook example of how the missionaries worked, with great open courtyards where crowds of indigenous converts could gather for teaching and mass. Huejotzingo is part of the UNESCO site of the Earliest Sixteenth-Century Monasteries on the Slopes of Popocatépetl, listed in 1994.
Read the complete Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael comes up about 29 km into the recorded legs. Next is Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew.
Calpan is a small town on the lower slopes of Popocatépetl, and in its centre stands a sixteenth-century Franciscan convent that is one of the masterpieces of early colonial art in Mexico. Built soon after the Spanish conquest, when friars were racing to convert the Indigenous population, the church is set within a huge walled atrium where crowds could gather for open-air Mass. In each corner of the atrium stands a posa, a small chapel used for processions, and the four posas at Calpan are covered in astonishing carved reliefs: the Last Judgment, the Annunciation, saints and symbols, carved by Indigenous craftsmen who mixed European designs with their own style.
Read the complete Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 42 km into the recorded legs you reach Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew. Next is Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C.
Tlaxcala has an unusual place in Mexican history, because its people were the main allies of Hernán Cortés in the conquest of the Aztec empire. The Tlaxcalans had resisted Aztec expansion for years, and when the Spanish arrived in 1519 they chose to fight with them rather than against them. In return, they received privileges, and the Franciscan friars who arrived soon after chose Tlaxcala as their first base on the mainland. The monastery and its church, begun in the sixteenth century, still stand above the town, a plain, massive building with a fine wooden ceiling in Moorish style.
Read the complete Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C, about halfway. Next is Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio.
Tochimilco sits high on the southern slopes of Popocatépetl, the great volcano that towers over central Mexico, and on clear mornings the snow-capped cone seems close enough to touch. Here, in the sixteenth century, Franciscan friars built a monastery dedicated to the Assumption of the Virgin, one of the early missions established to convert the indigenous population after the Spanish conquest. Its fortress-like church, with thick walls, battlements and a large atrium where crowds once gathered for open-air mass, is part of the UNESCO site of the Earliest Sixteenth-Century Monasteries on the Slopes of Popocatepetl, listed in 1994. In the town square, an old aqueduct and fountain built by the friars still bring water from the mountain.
Read the complete Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio sits at 168 km, about halfway. Next is back through Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C comes up about 251 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 304 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew. Next is back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael, late in the day. Next is Puebla.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Puebla write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 347 km.
Puebla → Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael → Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew → Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C → Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio is 78 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Temple and Former Convent of the Assumptio → back through Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C is 79 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Franciscan Ensemble of the Monastery and C → back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Andrew → back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Temple and Former Convent of Saint Michael → Puebla is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.