CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. 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.
A 703 km round trip from Parkent - roughly 14 h 02 in the saddle. The stops in between: Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part, Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B and back through Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 2,700 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It crosses Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
In the foothills of the Tian Shan, about an hour north-east of Tashkent, there is a building that looks as if it belongs in a science fiction film: a huge curved mirror, made of thousands of smaller mirrors, facing a field of tracking mirrors that follow the sun and focus its light onto a single point. This is the Big Solar Furnace near Parkent, built in the Soviet era in the 1980s, and still used for research into materials that can withstand extremely high temperatures.
Read the complete Big Solar Furnace write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Big Solar Furnace is where the day begins. Next is Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part.
Far up the Chatkal valley in western Kyrgyzstan, where the river runs between the Chatkal and Sandalash ranges of the Western Tien Shan, lies the Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve. It protects mountain steppe, juniper woodland, walnut and apple groves and rocky high country, and it is part of the transnational World Heritage Site of the Western Tien Shan, inscribed in 2016 and shared with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The reserve was created in particular to protect Menzbier's marmot, a small marmot found only in this part of Central Asia.
Read the complete Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part comes up 83 km in. Next is Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B.
In the south of Kazakhstan, where the western spurs of the Tien Shan rise from the steppe, the Sairam-Ugam National Park protects a landscape of high mountains, deep valleys, juniper forests and alpine meadows. It is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Western Tien Shan, shared between Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, recognised for its exceptional biodiversity, including wild relatives of fruit trees such as apples, pears and walnuts, which are believed to be the ancestors of many cultivated varieties.
Read the complete Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
165 km in you reach Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B. Next is back through Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part, late in the day. Next is Big Solar Furnace.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Big Solar Furnace write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Big Solar Furnace. That is the ride.
Big Solar Furnace → Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part is 91 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part → Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B is 74 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Sairam-Ugam State National Nature Park - B → back through Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part is 74 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Besh-Aral State Nature Reserve - main part → Big Solar Furnace is 91 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.