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 475 km round trip from Quillan - roughly 8 h 21 in the saddle. The stops in between: Château de Quéribus, Château et remparts de Carcassonne, Episcopal City of Albi and back through Château et remparts de Carcassonne. 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.
Perched on a rocky spur above a forest of firs and beeches, at around seven hundred metres, the castle of Puilaurens looks like something drawn by a child who loves castles: battlements, towers, walls following every edge of the rock. It is one of the so-called Cathar castles of the Languedoc, a group of fortresses linked to the crusade launched against the Cathar heretics in the thirteenth century. After the region came under French control, the castle was rebuilt as a royal fortress guarding the frontier with the Kingdom of Aragon, which lay just to the south until the seventeenth century. The climb up from the car park is steep but short, and the views from the top over the Fenouillèdes and the Pyrenean foothills are superb.
Read the complete Château de Puilaurens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Château de Puilaurens is where the day begins. Next is Château de Quéribus.
Quéribus clings to the top of a limestone pinnacle like a crown, so improbably perched that it is hard to believe people ever built it, let alone held it under siege. It is often described as the last Cathar stronghold: when Montségur fell in 1244, the remaining Cathar refugees and their supporters found shelter here, and the castle held out until 1255, when it finally surrendered to the forces of the French king. It then became a royal fortress guarding the border with Aragon, until the frontier moved south in 1659 and its usefulness ended.
Read the complete Château de Quéribus write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Château de Quéribus comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Château et remparts de Carcassonne.
Carcassonne has two faces. Down by the river Aude sits the ordinary lower town, a grid of streets laid out in the thirteenth century around a market square, and on the hill above rises the Cité, a double ring of walls and fifty-odd towers that looks like the illustration to a children's book about knights. The Cité was inscribed by UNESCO in 1997, and it is one of the most visited monuments in France, with the nearest sizeable roads and everything a rider needs just a kilometre away in the modern town.
Read the complete Château et remparts de Carcassonne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 128 km into the recorded legs you reach Château et remparts de Carcassonne. Next is Episcopal City of Albi.
Albi is built of brick, which is unusual in the south of France, and the colour changes through the day, from salmon in the morning to a deep red at dusk. The great cathedral of Sainte-Cécile dominates the old town, and from a distance it looks more like a fortress than a church, with a massive tower and walls that have no windows at the bottom. It was begun in the late thirteenth century, soon after the crusade against the Cathars had been won, and its builders wanted the faithful, and the heretics, to see where power lay. Inside, the painted vault and a huge fresco of the Last Judgement are astonishing. The whole episcopal city, with the old bridge and the bishop's palace, was listed by UNESCO in 2010.
Read the complete Episcopal City of Albi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Episcopal City of Albi, about halfway. Next is back through Château et remparts de Carcassonne.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Château et remparts de Carcassonne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Château et remparts de Carcassonne sits at 279 km, about halfway. Next is back through Château de Quéribus.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Château de Quéribus write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Château de Quéribus comes up about 440 km into the recorded legs. Next is Château de Puilaurens.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Château de Puilaurens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Château de Puilaurens closes the day.
Château de Puilaurens → Château de Quéribus is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Château de Quéribus → Château et remparts de Carcassonne is 94 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Château et remparts de Carcassonne → Episcopal City of Albi is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Episcopal City of Albi → back through Château et remparts de Carcassonne is 111 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Château et remparts de Carcassonne → back through Château de Quéribus is 92 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Château de Quéribus → Château de Puilaurens is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.