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 286 km round trip from Alpera - roughly 7 h 43 in the saddle. On the way it passes Barranco del Cabezo del moro, Abric Pedro más, Olula and Cantos de la Visera I. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 900 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Alpera is a farming town of about two thousand three hundred people on the high, wind-swept plain of southern Albacete, where La Mancha slides toward the Valencian hills. It is famous in the archaeology books for the Cueva de la Vieja, a shelter with a dense frieze of Levantine paintings, among the most celebrated in Spain, and the Cueva del Queso, the Cheese Cave, is one of its neighbours. Together these belong to the Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula, a UNESCO site since 1998.
Read the complete Cueva del Queso write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cueva del Queso is where the day begins. Next is Barranco del Cabezo del moro.
Almansa is one of those towns you see from the motorway and do not stop at, and that is a mistake. Its castle is spectacular, a Gothic fortress built on a sharp limestone outcrop right in the middle of town, looking exactly like a child's drawing of a castle. Around it spreads a wide plain at about seven hundred metres, the meeting point of the Valencian, Murcian and Castilian lands, and a few kilometres out in the surrounding hills lies the ravine known as the Barranco del Cabezo del Moro.
Read the complete Barranco del Cabezo del moro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Barranco del Cabezo del moro comes up about 39 km into the recorded legs. Next is Abric Pedro más.
Almansa announces itself from far away: a castle perched on a limestone crag right in the middle of the town, its walls and towers silhouetted against the sky. The town sits at the eastern edge of La Mancha, where the high plateau meets the mountains of Valencia, and it was here, in April 1707, that one of the decisive battles of the War of the Spanish Succession was fought, when the Bourbon army defeated an allied force and secured the throne of Spain for Philip V. A monument on the battlefield and a museum in town tell the story. In the hills to the north, near Alpera, the Abric Pedro Mas holds prehistoric paintings, part of the UNESCO listing of Rock Art of the Mediterranean Basin on the Iberian Peninsula. Nearby, the Cueva de la Vieja is one of the best-known Levantine sites, with archers, deer and goats.
Read the complete Abric Pedro más write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 67 km into the recorded legs you reach Abric Pedro más. Next is Olula.
Caudete and Almansa sit in a corridor of land where Castile-La Mancha, Valencia and Murcia meet, and for centuries this was frontier country, where kingdoms and armies passed and fought. Olula is a point in the hills near Caudete, linked on the rides with rock-art shelters in the surrounding sierras, part of the extensive UNESCO listing of prehistoric art in Mediterranean Spain.
Read the complete Olula write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Olula, about halfway. Next is Cantos de la Visera I.
Monte Arabí rises from the high plain north of Yecla like a ship run aground, a lonely mass of sandstone with flat top and fluted sides, and locals have told stories about it for centuries: Moorish treasure, enchanted caves, a hidden city. The real treasure is painted. The Cantos de la Visera shelters on its slopes hold prehistoric rock art, including Levantine figures of animals and schematic signs, and they belong to the great series of Mediterranean rock art sites listed by UNESCO. There are also strange carved holes and basins in the rock, whose purpose is still debated.
Read the complete Cantos de la Visera I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cantos de la Visera I sits at 110 km, about halfway. Next is back through Olula.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Olula write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Olula comes up about 190 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Abric Pedro más.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Abric Pedro más write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 218 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Abric Pedro más. Next is back through Barranco del Cabezo del moro.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Barranco del Cabezo del moro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Barranco del Cabezo del moro, late in the day. Next is Cueva del Queso.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cueva del Queso write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 286 km.
Cueva del Queso → Barranco del Cabezo del moro is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Barranco del Cabezo del moro → Abric Pedro más is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Abric Pedro más → Olula is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Olula → Cantos de la Visera I is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cantos de la Visera I → back through Olula is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Olula → back through Abric Pedro más is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Abric Pedro más → back through Barranco del Cabezo del moro is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Barranco del Cabezo del moro → Cueva del Queso is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.