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.
A 472 km round trip from Corris - roughly 7 h 19 in the saddle. On the way it passes Harlech Castle, The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales, Conwy Castle and Town Walls and Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 39 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
High above the village of Abergynolwyn, in a side valley where the sheep outnumber everyone, the spoil heaps of Bryneglwys tell you that this quiet corner of southern Snowdonia was once an industrial place. Slate was cut here through the second half of the nineteenth century and into the twentieth, and the whole reason the little Talyllyn Railway exists is to carry it down the valley to the coast at Tywyn. The quarry finally closed just after the Second World War, and the railway, which should have died with it, was taken over by volunteers in 1951 and became the first preserved railway in the world. You can still walk up from the old incline at Nant Gwernol into the quarry workings, past roofless barracks and wheel pits, with streams running through all of it.
Read the complete Bryneglwys Slate Quarry write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bryneglwys Slate Quarry is where the day begins. Next is Harlech Castle.
When Edward I built his castles in Wales, he was not interested in subtlety. Harlech, raised between 1283 and 1289 by the master mason James of St George, sits on a rocky crag above the dunes of Cardigan Bay, with concentric walls, massive gatehouse and round towers that still look ready for a siege. It is one of the castles of Edward I in Gwynedd listed by UNESCO, together with Caernarfon, Conwy and Beaumaris. The sea once came almost to the foot of the rock, and a staircase down the cliff allowed the garrison to be supplied by boat; the coast has since moved, and now there is a broad plain of dunes and a golf course between the castle and the water.
Read the complete Harlech Castle write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Harlech Castle comes up about 63 km into the recorded legs. Next is The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales.
Llanberis sits at the foot of Snowdon, Yr Wyddfa in Welsh, beside the lake of Llyn Padarn, and across the water a whole mountainside has been carved into giant terraces. This is the Dinorwic quarry, once one of the largest slate quarries in the world, where thousands of men worked until it closed in 1969, splitting slate for roofs across Britain and beyond. The galleries climb the mountain in steps, with inclines, ruined buildings and waste heaps everywhere, a landscape both scarred and strangely beautiful. In 2021, UNESCO inscribed the Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales, recognising the quarries, villages, railways and harbours that made this region the slate capital of the world.
Read the complete The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 108 km into the recorded legs you reach The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales. Next is Conwy Castle and Town Walls.
Edward I built Conwy Castle in just four years, from 1283 to 1287, as part of his campaign to subdue the Welsh, and the result is one of the most impressive medieval fortresses in Europe. Designed by the master mason James of St George, it stands on a rock above the estuary of the Conwy river, with eight massive towers and high curtain walls, and the town below is still enclosed by its original walls, with twenty-one towers and three gateways. Walking along the walls gives superb views of the town, the castle, the estuary and the mountains of Snowdonia. The castles and town walls of King Edward in Gwynedd were inscribed on the UNESCO list in 1986.
Read the complete Conwy Castle and Town Walls write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Conwy Castle and Town Walls, about halfway. Next is Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City.
Liverpool turned its back on the land and faced the sea, and the waterfront shows it. The Pier Head is dominated by three great buildings, the Royal Liver Building with its two clock towers topped by mythical Liver Birds, the Cunard Building and the Port of Liverpool Building, known as the Three Graces, built in the early twentieth century when the city was one of the richest ports in the world. Behind them the docks, warehouses and merchants' houses of the old town tell the story of a city that grew from trade in cotton, sugar, tobacco and, painfully, enslaved people.
Read the complete Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City sits at 187 km, about halfway. Next is back through Conwy Castle and Town Walls.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Conwy Castle and Town Walls write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Conwy Castle and Town Walls comes up about 324 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 361 km into the recorded legs you reach back through The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales. Next is back through Harlech Castle.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Harlech Castle write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Harlech Castle, late in the day. Next is Bryneglwys Slate Quarry.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bryneglwys Slate Quarry write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 472 km.
Bryneglwys Slate Quarry → Harlech Castle is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Harlech Castle → The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales → Conwy Castle and Town Walls is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Conwy Castle and Town Walls → Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City is 89 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Liverpool - Maritime Mercantile City → back through Conwy Castle and Town Walls is 89 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Conwy Castle and Town Walls → back through The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The Slate Landscape of Northwest Wales → back through Harlech Castle is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Harlech Castle → Bryneglwys Slate Quarry is 64 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.