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 Polonnaruwa it runs 657 km to Polonnaruwa; allow about 15 h 21 of riding. It goes by way of Central Highlands of Sri Lanka, Horton Plains National Park and back through Central Highlands of Sri Lanka. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Polonnaruwa was the capital of Sri Lanka from the late tenth to the early thirteenth century, after the older capital at Anuradhapura was sacked, and its ruins are spread across a wide area of parkland beside a vast artificial lake. That lake, the Parakrama Samudra, was built by King Parakramabahu I in the twelfth century, and it is a testament to the ambition of the man who famously declared that not a single drop of rain should flow to the sea without serving people first. It still irrigates the paddy fields around the town today.
Read the complete Ancient City of Polonnaruwa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ancient City of Polonnaruwa is where the day begins. Next is Central Highlands of Sri Lanka.
North of Kandy the hills rise into a jagged massif that British surveyors thought looked like the knuckles of a clenched fist, and the name stuck: the Knuckles Range. It is one of the three parts of the Central Highlands World Heritage site, together with the Peak Wilderness and Horton Plains, and it is the wildest and least visited. The mountains are covered with montane forest, cloud forest at the highest points, grasslands and steep valleys with rivers and waterfalls. The weather changes fast; mist can sweep in over a ridge in minutes, and the air is noticeably cooler than in the plains. Many plants, frogs and lizards here exist nowhere else on Earth.
Read the complete Central Highlands of Sri Lanka write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Central Highlands of Sri Lanka comes up about 155 km into the recorded legs. Next is Horton Plains National Park.
Horton Plains is a high, cool plateau in the central highlands of Sri Lanka, at around two thousand metres, and it feels a world away from the island's beaches and jungles. The ground is rolling grassland and patches of stunted cloud forest, wind-bent and covered in moss, with rhododendron and wild flowers at the edges. The air is thin and cold, and in the morning you may see breath and frost on the grass. Sambar deer graze in the open, and the park is home to many endemic birds and to rare small mammals, such as the Horton Plains slender loris.
Read the complete Horton Plains National Park write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 327 km into the recorded legs you reach Horton Plains National Park. Next is back through Central Highlands of Sri Lanka.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Central Highlands of Sri Lanka write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Central Highlands of Sri Lanka, late in the day. Next is Ancient City of Polonnaruwa.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ancient City of Polonnaruwa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Ancient City of Polonnaruwa. That is the ride.
Ancient City of Polonnaruwa → Central Highlands of Sri Lanka is 155 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Central Highlands of Sri Lanka → Horton Plains National Park is 172 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Horton Plains National Park → back through Central Highlands of Sri Lanka is 174 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Central Highlands of Sri Lanka → Ancient City of Polonnaruwa is 155 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.