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 417 km round trip from Kofínou - roughly 8 h 33 in the saddle. It goes by way of Painted Churches in the Troodos Region, Ayios Ionannis, Church of Ayia Sotira and Church of Panayia. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 800 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Long before the Greeks, the Phoenicians or the Romans arrived in Cyprus, people lived on a hillside above the Maroni river in the southern part of the island, in round stone houses with flat roofs, packed close together inside a defensive wall. Choirokoitia is a Neolithic settlement dating back to around the seventh millennium BC, one of the most important prehistoric sites in the eastern Mediterranean. The inhabitants farmed, herded animals and buried their dead under the floors of their houses. Several of the round houses have been reconstructed near the entrance, giving a vivid sense of how they lived. The site received UNESCO recognition in 1998.
Read the complete Choirokoitia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Choirokoitia is where the day begins. Next is Painted Churches in the Troodos Region.
From the outside they look like barns: low stone buildings with steep pitched roofs of flat tiles, sometimes covered by a second wooden roof to keep off the snow. Inside, every surface glows with Byzantine and post-Byzantine frescoes. The painted churches of the Troodos mountains in Cyprus, nine of them inscribed in 1985 and a tenth added in 2001, form one of the richest collections of Byzantine painting anywhere.
Read the complete Painted Churches in the Troodos Region write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Painted Churches in the Troodos Region comes up about 45 km into the recorded legs. Next is Ayios Ionannis.
Ayios Ionannis here means the monastery of Saint John Lambadistis, at Kalopanagiotis, a village in the Marathasa valley on the northern side of the Troodos mountains. It is a strange and lovely building, three churches joined together under one big wooden roof, each added in a different century, so that stepping from one to the next is like walking through the history of Cypriot painting. Frescoes cover nearly every wall, from the Byzantine saints of the twelfth century to the more elaborate cycles of the fifteenth, in colours that glow in the dim light. It is one of the painted churches of the Troodos, listed by UNESCO in 1985.
Read the complete Ayios Ionannis write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 100 km into the recorded legs you reach Ayios Ionannis. Next is Church of Ayia Sotira.
This point lies in the northern foothills of the Troodos range, in a landscape of dry stone terraces, carob and olive trees, and villages that tilt down towards the Nicosia plain. What I can say is that the villages around it, Peléndri and Kyperoúnta among them, belong to one of the richest church regions in the eastern Mediterranean. The Troodos painted churches, ten of them on the UNESCO list, are small, steep-roofed stone buildings that hide Byzantine frescoes inside, and one of them, the Timios Stavros, stands at Peléndri.
Read the complete Church of Ayia Sotira write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Church of Ayia Sotira, about halfway. Next is Church of Panayia.
The Troodos mountains rise in the middle of Cyprus, covered in black pine, oak and cedar, with the summit of Mount Olympus at 1,952 metres, which gets snow in winter and has a small ski area. Hidden in the villages of the range are ten small churches that UNESCO listed in 2001, because their walls hold one of the finest collections of Byzantine and post-Byzantine wall paintings in the world, dating from the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries. The label does not say which church this is, and there are several dedicated to Panayia, the Virgin, so I will describe the group, which is what makes any one of them special.
Read the complete Church of Panayia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Church of Panayia sits at 139 km, about halfway. Next is back through Church of Ayia Sotira.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Church of Ayia Sotira write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Church of Ayia Sotira comes up about 262 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Ayios Ionannis.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ayios Ionannis write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 317 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Ayios Ionannis. Next is back through Painted Churches in the Troodos Region.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Painted Churches in the Troodos Region write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Painted Churches in the Troodos Region, late in the day. Next is Choirokoitia.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Choirokoitia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 417 km.
Choirokoitia → Painted Churches in the Troodos Region is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Painted Churches in the Troodos Region → Ayios Ionannis is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ayios Ionannis → Church of Ayia Sotira is 56 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Church of Ayia Sotira → Church of Panayia is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Church of Panayia → back through Church of Ayia Sotira is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Church of Ayia Sotira → back through Ayios Ionannis is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ayios Ionannis → back through Painted Churches in the Troodos Region is 56 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Painted Churches in the Troodos Region → Choirokoitia is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.