Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve and Component of Plešivec plateau

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve

   Bardejov's main square is a long, gently sloping rectangle lined with Gothic and Renaissance burgher houses, their tall gables painted in pastel colours, with the Gothic Basilica of St Giles at the top and the old town hall standing alone in the middle. The town grew rich in the Middle Ages on trade between Hungary and Poland, and its walls, bastions and moat largely survive. Bardejov was inscribed on the UNESCO list in 2000, along with its Jewish suburb, with a synagogue and ritual bath from the eighteenth century, a reminder of the community that lived here until the Holocaust.

   Read the complete Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve is where the day begins. Next is Levoča.

2. 2. Levoča

   Spread across a ridge in eastern Slovakia, with the jagged peaks of the High Tatras rising on the northern horizon, the Spiš region holds one of Europe's great clusters of medieval monuments. The town of Levoča, the old regional capital, was a wealthy royal free town, and its walls, burgher houses and Renaissance town hall still surround a long central square. Inside the church of St James stands Master Paul of Levoča's carved Gothic altarpiece, finished in the early sixteenth century and the tallest of its kind in the world, an astonishing tower of limewood saints and filigree.

   Read the complete Levoča write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Levoča comes up about 81 km into the recorded legs. Next is Component of Plešivec plateau.

3. 3. Component of Plešivec plateau

   The Slovak Karst is a world of limestone plateaus and deep gorges in southern Slovakia, along the Hungarian border, and the Plešivec plateau is one of its great tablelands, a high, flat-topped block of rock rising steeply above the valleys of the Slaná and the Štítnik rivers. Its surface is a rolling steppe of grass and scrub, pitted with sinkholes, and beneath it lies a maze of caves and abysses, part of the UNESCO site of the Caves of Aggtelek Karst and Slovak Karst.

   Read the complete Component of Plešivec plateau write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 170 km into the recorded legs you reach Component of Plešivec plateau. Next is back through Levoča.

4. 4. back through Levoča

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Levoča write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Levoča, late in the day. Next is Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve.

5. 5. Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Bardejov Town Conservation Reserve. That is the ride.