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 359 km round trip from Kakopetriá - roughly 6 h 05 in the saddle. It goes by way of Paphos, Choirokoitia and back through Paphos. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 800 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
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 is where the day begins. Next is Paphos.
The ride that brings you here starts in Paphos but belongs, for a while, to Aphrodite. Kouklia, a village on the southwest coast of Cyprus, sits on the site of Palaepaphos, the old Paphos, where the goddess of love was worshipped for well over a thousand years before the Romans arrived. Ancient writers placed her birth in the sea off this coast, and a rock offshore near here is still called Aphrodite's Rock. The sanctuary was a pilgrimage centre across the Mediterranean, and pilgrims travelled from Greece, Egypt and Phoenicia to reach it.
Read the complete Paphos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paphos comes up about 74 km into the recorded legs. Next is Choirokoitia.
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.
about 179 km into the recorded legs you reach Choirokoitia. Next is back through Paphos.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Paphos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Paphos, late in the day. Next is Church of Panayia.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Church of Panayia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Church of Panayia. That is the ride.
Church of Panayia → Paphos is 74 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Paphos → Choirokoitia is 105 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Choirokoitia → back through Paphos is 105 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Paphos → Church of Panayia is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.