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 487 km round trip from Bárcabo - roughly 8 h 48 in the saddle. On the way it passes El Remosillo, Les Coves, Cova del Tabac and Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,200 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
The Sierra de Guara is limestone country, and it behaves like it: the rivers have sliced through the rock in deep canyons, the villages sit on crags, and the sky is full of vultures. Cueva de Malifeto is in the foothills of the range, eleven kilometres from Alquézar, a village that grew up around a hilltop collegiate church above the gorge of the Río Vero. The name has a slightly sinister ring in Spanish, and shepherds in these hills have always had stories about odd and shadowy places.
Read the complete Cueva de Malifeto write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva de Malifeto is where the day begins. Next is El Remosillo.
If you ride north from Barbastro toward Graus, the Ésera river eventually forces its way through a ridge of limestone, and the result is the Congosto de Olvena, a short, deep gorge with the road squeezed between rock and water. Up on the cliffs around here are rock shelters with prehistoric paintings, and El Remosillo is one of the best known in this corner of Aragón, between Estadilla, Graus and Fonz.
Read the complete El Remosillo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
El Remosillo comes up about 54 km into the recorded legs. Next is Les Coves.
The western edge of Catalonia, around Lleida, is fruit country. Irrigation canals bring water from the Pyrenean rivers to a broad, flat plain of orchards growing apples, pears and peaches, laid out in neat lines that stretch to the horizon. Les Coves lies in this area, close to the Aragonese border, between Alfarràs, Albelda and Algerri, where the valley of the Noguera Ribagorçana spills out of the hills and onto the plain.
Read the complete Les Coves write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 100 km into the recorded legs you reach Les Coves. Next is Cova del Tabac.
Above the village of Camarasa, where the Segre comes out of the pre-Pyrenean hills onto the plain of Lleida, a cave in the limestone holds some of the most interesting rock paintings in Catalonia. The Cova del Tabac, the tobacco cave, is a wide shelter with schematic paintings, simplified human figures, animals and symbols in red, and it is one of the sites included in the UNESCO listing of Mediterranean rock art on the Iberian Peninsula. A short walk leads up from the road to the shelter, which also offers a fine view over the valley, and on a clear day the Pyrenees rise white on the northern horizon.
Read the complete Cova del Tabac write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cova del Tabac, about halfway. Next is Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros.
Where the Segre comes down from the Pyrenees towards the plains of Lleida, it squeezes through a gap at Oliana, held back by a dam and a reservoir that fills the valley above. On the slopes nearby, Roc del Rumbau, also called the Roca dels Moros, the Moors' rock, is a shelter with prehistoric paintings, one of the Catalan sites of the World Heritage Site of Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin. The name is a common one in Catalonia and Spain: local people often attributed anything ancient and mysterious to the Moors.
Read the complete Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros sits at 171 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cova del Tabac.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cova del Tabac write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cova del Tabac comes up about 319 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Les Coves.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Les Coves write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 389 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Les Coves. Next is back through El Remosillo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete El Remosillo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through El Remosillo, late in the day. Next is Cueva de Malifeto.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cueva de Malifeto write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 487 km.
Cueva de Malifeto → El Remosillo is 54 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
El Remosillo → Les Coves is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Les Coves → Cova del Tabac is 70 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cova del Tabac → Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros is 74 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Roc del Rumbau o Roca dels moros → back through Cova del Tabac is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cova del Tabac → back through Les Coves is 70 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Les Coves → back through El Remosillo is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through El Remosillo → Cueva de Malifeto is 54 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.