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.
206 km one way from Chur - plan on about 3 h 37 of riding. The climbs: Julierpass high road, Albula Pass railway country and Flüelapass high section. It tops out at 2,383 m. Lenzerheide Pass, Albula Pass and Fluela Pass are subject to seasonal closure - check it is open before you set off. It is a high-mountain day.
The ground tilts up and stays tilted for 36 km. 882 m of it, taken steadily rather than in one wall. A steady rhythm suits this better than bursts. The height arrives whether you hurry or not.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
Cold comes early up here and stays late. Ride it with something in reserve: the summit is not the end of the work, only the middle of it. The last of the trees go and the road runs out onto open ground. The summit sits at 2383 m, and what surrounds it is rock, weather and distance.
75 km that neither climbs nor drops much. The road settles into the ground rather than fighting it — this is where a day makes up time without anyone trying. Third and fourth, and very little else.
At 593 metres, in a wide bend of the Rhine valley, Chur makes a strong claim to be the oldest town in Switzerland, with traces of settlement going back thousands of years and a Roman presence from the first century BC. It has been the seat of a bishop since late antiquity, and the bishop's court, with its cathedral, sits on a terrace above the old town. Down below, the narrow streets and squares of the Altstadt, with painted houses, fountains and arcades, are a pleasant place to wander after a morning in the saddle.
Read the complete Chur write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Chur is where the day begins. Next is Lenzerheide balcony road, climbing 882 m.
Lenzerheide is a high, wide valley south of Chur, a broad saddle of meadow, forest and small lakes at about 1,475 metres. The twin villages of Lenzerheide and Valbella have fuel, cafes and shops, and Chur, a little more than fourteen kilometres north, has everything else.
Read the complete Lenzerheide balcony road write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Lenzerheide balcony road comes up about 18 km into the recorded legs. The road climbs 882 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 6 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Next is Julierpass high road, climbing 809 m.
The Julier is one of the oldest crossings in the Alps, and the summit at 2,284 metres still carries two stumps of stone columns beside the road, thought to be the remains of a Roman shrine. The Romans pushed a road over the pass in the first century, and ever since the route has linked the Oberhalbstein valley with the Engadin, carrying merchants and pilgrims between Chur and the Bergell and the passes south. A small lake sits near the top and a handful of buildings, but there is not much else, and it can be bleak and windy.
Read the complete Julierpass high road write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
2284 m, and the road stops climbing. The road climbs 809 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 11 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. At this height the road is a summer one: snow gates can stay shut into June and shut again in October. Next is Albula Pass railway country.
The Albula Pass is the road, but the railway is the star. At 2,315 metres the pass links the Engadine with the Albula valley and Chur, and it is shadowed by the Rhaetian Railway's Albula line, which climbs through spiral tunnels, over viaducts and under the mountain in the Albula tunnel. UNESCO put this line and the Bernina line on the World Heritage list in 2008, and on a clear day you can watch the red trains from the road.
Read the complete Albula Pass railway country write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The high point of this section, 2315 m up. Reckon on about 12 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Next is Flüelapass high section.
The scenery is stark: bare rock, screes, snow patches and a handful of small, dark lakes, with the Flüela Wisshorn and the Schwarzhorn rising on either side. Davos, the highest town of its size in the Alps, is ten and a half kilometres away, and Zernez about twelve.
Read the complete Flüelapass high section write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Flüelapass high section tops the climb at 2383 m. Nothing on this route is higher. Next is Davos food and weather check, mostly downhill.
Davos sits at about 1,560 metres in a long, high valley in eastern Graubünden, and it claims to be the highest city in Europe, which depends on how you count. It has about eleven thousand people and has been a health resort since the nineteenth century, when the dry mountain air was prescribed for tuberculosis, and a sanatorium culture grew up here. Thomas Mann, who visited his wife during her treatment in 1912, based his novel The Magic Mountain on the experience, and the expressionist painter Ernst Ludwig Kirchner moved to the valley and spent his last years working in the hills.
Read the complete Davos food and weather check write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Davos food and weather check is where this day stops to eat. You lose 823 m on the way down to it, steadily. Reckon on about 7 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Next is Landquart return, mostly downhill.
Landquart is a railway junction that turned into a town, and a good place to understand how Graubünden ties together. The village lies on the floor of the Rhine valley, a few kilometres north of Chur, at the mouth of the Landquart river, which comes down from the Prättigau and the high passes of the east. It is the point where the Rhaetian Railway, the narrow-gauge line that climbs to Davos and St. Moritz, leaves the main line, and the red trains wait at the platform beside the big Swiss ones. At 523 metres, it is low, mild and often warm, a contrast to the high Alps that lie ahead.
Read the complete Landquart return gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Landquart return closes the day. You lose 1037 m on the way down to it, steadily.
Chur fuel gate → Lenzerheide balcony road climbs about 882 m in 18 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Lenzerheide balcony road → Julierpass high road climbs about 809 m in 47 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Julierpass high road → Albula Pass railway country is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Albula Pass railway country → Flüelapass high section is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Flüelapass high section → Davos food and weather check drops about 823 m over 14 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.
Davos food and weather check → Landquart return gate drops about 1037 m over 44 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.