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 228 km round trip from Ravenshoe - roughly 4 h 21 in the saddle. On the way it passes Component around Hugh Nelson Range, Component around Curtain Fig, Main component and back through Component around Curtain Fig. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 900 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 33 km this is Atherton Tablelands Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Up on the Atherton Tableland, behind Cairns in far north Queensland, the land rises from the hot coastal plain to a cooler plateau of volcanic soil, rolling farmland and patches of dense rainforest. Near Ravenshoe, which claims to be the highest town in Queensland, the forest around Malaan is one of the components of the Wet Tropics of Queensland World Heritage site, a long strip of tropical rainforest along the coast and the Great Dividing Range that contains some of the oldest continuously surviving rainforest on Earth. The forests are home to tree kangaroos, possums, rare frogs and birds, and, in the lowlands, the cassowary, a large flightless bird with a bony crest that is best admired from a distance.
Read the complete Component around Malaan write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Malaan is where the day begins. Next is Component around Hugh Nelson Range.
The Atherton Tableland is the bit of tropical Queensland that feels like it has wandered in from somewhere cooler. At seven or eight hundred metres above the sea, the plateau behind Cairns has red volcanic soil, dairy pastures, crater lakes and patches of rainforest that cling to the ridges.
Read the complete Component around Hugh Nelson Range write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Hugh Nelson Range comes up about 33 km into the recorded legs. Next is Component around Curtain Fig.
A single tree, but what a tree. The Curtain Fig near Yungaburra, on the Atherton Tablelands of tropical north Queensland, is a strangler fig that started life as a seed dropped by a bird high in the canopy of another tree. Its roots grew down to the ground, wrapping and eventually killing the host, which then fell against a neighbour, leaving the fig at an angle. The roots kept dropping down from the tilted trunk, creating a hanging curtain of aerial roots that reaches the forest floor. A boardwalk lets you walk around it, and it is one of the most photographed trees in Australia.
Read the complete Component around Curtain Fig write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 59 km into the recorded legs you reach Component around Curtain Fig. Next is Main component.
Inland from the cane fields south of Cairns, the land rears up into a wall of rainforest so dense that the ridgelines seem to steam after every shower. Gordonvale lies about fourteen kilometres to the north, Babinda a little further south, and the tableland town of Yungaburra up over the range to the west.
Read the complete Main component write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Main component, about halfway. Next is back through Component around Curtain Fig.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Curtain Fig write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Component around Curtain Fig sits at 113 km, about halfway. Next is back through Component around Hugh Nelson Range.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Hugh Nelson Range write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Component around Hugh Nelson Range comes up about 195 km into the recorded legs. Next is Component around Malaan.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Component around Malaan write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Component around Malaan closes the day.
Component around Malaan → Component around Hugh Nelson Range is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Component around Hugh Nelson Range → Component around Curtain Fig is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Component around Curtain Fig → Main component is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Main component → back through Component around Curtain Fig is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Component around Curtain Fig → back through Component around Hugh Nelson Range is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Component around Hugh Nelson Range → Component around Malaan is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.