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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 417 km round trip from Alba Iulia - roughly 7 h 12 in the saddle. The stops in between: Village of Câlnic, Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea, Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia and back through Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,400 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 29 km this is Romania Transalpina, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Apulum was a metropolis on the Mureș, and today it is mostly under Alba Iulia's streets and fields. In Roman Dacia, which was conquered by Trajan in 106 AD, the legion XIII Gemina was stationed here, and around the camp grew two towns, one for the soldiers' families and traders and a second, grander one that gained the rank of colony. Apulum was the wealthiest city of the province, and probably its capital for a time, thanks in part to the gold mines of the nearby Apuseni Mountains.
Read the complete Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate is where the day begins. Next is Village of Câlnic.
Câlnic, a small village south of Sebeș in Alba county, is home to one of the strangest fortresses among the Saxon sites of Transylvania. Unlike most of its neighbours, it began not as a fortified church but as a noble residence. In the thirteenth century a local count built a stone keep here, surrounded by walls and a moat. Later the villagers bought it, added a chapel and storerooms, and turned it into a peasant refuge, where families could shelter from raids behind the walls. The result, still ringed by water on parts of its perimeter, is part of the Villages with Fortified Churches in Transylvania World Heritage site.
Read the complete Village of Câlnic write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Village of Câlnic comes up about 71 km into the recorded legs. Next is Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea.
High above the Sebeș and Cugir valleys, where the Șureanu foothills fold into long grassy shoulders, the Romans kept watch over the southern approaches to their province of Dacia. The name on the map, Muncelu-Lăutaorea, belongs to the ridge country above Pianu de Jos, and it is one of the many small frontier points that archaeologists have tied to the Roman defensive system here. Do not expect walls to lean on. What survives on these hilltops is usually a faint platform, a ditch you notice only when the light is low, and a view that explains everything about why a sentry was posted there.
Read the complete Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 149 km into the recorded legs you reach Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea. Next is Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia.
Sarmizegetusa Regia was the capital of the Dacian kings, built high in the Orăștie mountains in the first century BC and the first century AD, and it is one of the most atmospheric ruins in Europe. A fortress of stone blocks, a sacred precinct of circular and rectangular temples, and terraces for houses and workshops were laid out on a series of platforms among beech forest, at an altitude of around 1,200 metres. The sanctuary is the star, with rings of stone bases and wooden posts, and a large circular platform of andesite stones that may have worked as a calendar or a place for ritual. Cut stones and finely made tiles show Greek and Roman influence.
Read the complete Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia, about halfway. Next is back through Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea sits at 278 km, about halfway. Next is back through Village of Câlnic.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Village of Câlnic write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Village of Câlnic comes up about 344 km into the recorded legs. Next is Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate closes the day.
Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate → Village of Câlnic is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Village of Câlnic → Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea is 78 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea → Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Grădiștea de Munte - Sarmizegetusa Regia → back through Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Pianu de Jos - Muncelu-Lăutaorea → back through Village of Câlnic is 78 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Village of Câlnic → Alba Iulia - Apulum / Cetate is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.