Corabia - Sucidava / Celei and Izbășești - Valea Albă
Plan this ride
Recorded distance
285 km
Riding-time estimate
6 h 00
Journey
Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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.
From Corabia it runs 285 km to Corabia; allow about 6 h 00 of riding. The stops in between: Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort, Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor, Izbășești - Valea Albă and back through Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor. It crosses from Bulgaria into Romania - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Corabia - Sucidava / Celei
At Celei, a few kilometres from Corabia on the Danube, the Romans built a bridge. It is a thing worth pausing over, because the bridge was built in AD 328, in the time of Constantine the Great, and it linked the Roman fortress of Sucidava on the northern bank with the province on the other side. The bridge was nearly two and a half kilometres long, one of the grandest engineering projects of the late empire, and it gave Rome a way to project power across the river long after the rest of the frontier had begun to crumble. A later emperor, Justinian, rebuilt Sucidava in the sixth century, and the fortress was in use for a very long time.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Corabia - Sucidava / Celei is where the day begins. Next is Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort.
2. Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort
Slăveni is farm country, and the fort here is the sort of ruin you have to meet halfway. "La Cetate" simply means "at the fortress", the name locals gave to a rise in the fields long before anyone excavated it, and what remains of the Roman auxiliary fort is mostly a matter of banks, ditches and the shape of the ground rather than standing walls. If you expect a Hadrian's Wall photograph you will be disappointed; if you like imagining a few hundred soldiers watching a very flat horizon, you will be fine.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort comes up about 49 km into the recorded legs. Next is Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor.
3. Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor
Out on the flat Romanian plain east of the Olt river, the village of Crâmpoia sits among endless fields of wheat, maize and sunflowers, and its name has a place in Roman history. A Roman earthen fort near the village stood on the Limes Transalutanus, the frontier line that the Romans built east of the Olt in the early third century, running from the Danube northward toward the Carpathians, a long earthen rampart with forts and watchtowers. The local name Reduta Tătarilor, the Tatars' redoubt, reflects a common habit in Romania of attributing old earthworks to the Tatars or other invaders, long after the Romans were forgotten. The site is part of the UNESCO-listed frontier of Dacia.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 97 km into the recorded legs you reach Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor. Next is Izbășești - Valea Albă.
4. Izbășești - Valea Albă
Between Pitești and Slatina, in the south of Romania, the land falls away from the Carpathian foothills towards the great Danube plain in a series of long, low ridges cut by streams. It is farming country, with fields of maize and sunflowers, orchards, vineyards and small villages strung along the valleys. Izbășești and the valley called Valea Albă, the White Valley, lie in this landscape near the small town of Stolnici, and the site recorded here is one of the many archaeological traces in the area, though there is probably little to see on the ground.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Corabia - Sucidava / Celei closes the day.
Leg by leg
Corabia - Sucidava / Celei to Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort
Corabia - Sucidava / Celei → Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort is 49 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort to Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor
Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort → Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor to Izbășești - Valea Albă
Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor → Izbășești - Valea Albă is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Izbășești - Valea Albă to back through Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor
Izbășești - Valea Albă → back through Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor to back through Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort
back through Crâmpoia - Reduta Tătarilor → back through Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort to Corabia - Sucidava / Celei
back through Slăveni - La Cetate - auxiliary fort → Corabia - Sucidava / Celei is 49 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.