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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Wauwil it runs 318 km to Wauwil; allow about 5 h 29 of riding. On the way it passes Burgäschisee Ost, Old City of Berne, Rütte and En Praz des Gueux. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,150 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
This part of the ride is 40 km of Emmental Panorama Road.
For about 34 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it. Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
Archaeologists named a whole Neolithic culture after Egolzwil, a small village in the canton of Lucerne, because the settlements found in the Wauwiler Moos, a former lake turned into peat bog, revealed a way of life older than anything else known in the region at the time. Egolzwil 3, one of these sites, was a village of farmers who lived on the shore of a small lake over six thousand years ago, and it counts as one component of UNESCO's inscription of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps. The lake was drained in the nineteenth century to create farmland, and the remains were preserved in the wet peat.
Read the complete Egolzwil 3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Egolzwil 3 is where the day begins. Next is Burgäschisee Ost.
Burgäschisee is a small, quiet lake on the border between the cantons of Bern and Solothurn, surrounded by reeds, woods and farmland. It would be easy to ride past without noticing, but it holds a secret: along its shores, archaeologists have found the remains of Neolithic villages built on piles, dating back more than five thousand years. The eastern shore site, Burgäschisee Ost, is one of the components of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps World Heritage site, listed by UNESCO in 2011. There is nothing much to see on the surface, as the remains lie underwater or in the soft ground, but the peaceful setting makes it easy to imagine the wooden houses, canoes and fishing nets of those early farmers.
Read the complete Burgäschisee Ost write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Burgäschisee Ost comes up about 35 km into the recorded legs. Next is Old City of Berne.
Bern does not shout. The Swiss capital sits on a sandstone spur in a tight loop of the green Aare, with six kilometres of arcaded streets that let you walk the whole old town in the rain without getting wet. It was founded in 1191 by Duke Berthold V of Zähringen, and legend says he named it after the first animal he killed hunting nearby, a bear. The bears have been the town's mascots ever since, and a few still live in the BärenPark down by the river at the end of the Nydeggbrücke.
Read the complete Old City of Berne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 75 km into the recorded legs you reach Old City of Berne. Next is Rütte.
Rütte sits on the gentle southern slope above Lake Biel, a scatter of farms and orchards between the village of Bellmund and the lakeshore, with the long blue ridge of the Jura filling the view across the water. Nidau and the city of Biel are a few minutes away, yet up here it feels thoroughly rural: cows, cherry trees, a sharp smell of cut grass in early summer and the clank of a tractor somewhere below.
Read the complete Rütte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rütte, about halfway. Next is En Praz des Gueux.
Fribourg is the town where French and German meet. It was founded in 1157 by the dukes of Zähringen on a rock in a loop of the Sarine river, and the old city still sits above the water, with a Gothic cathedral, covered wooden bridges and steep cobbled lanes. The border between the languages runs through the city, so locals switch between French and a Swiss German dialect, and the divide has a name, the Röstigraben, after the potato dish that lies on one side. Beyond the city, the canton is green and rolling, with farms, forests and pastures that produce the famous cheese of Gruyères.
Read the complete En Praz des Gueux write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
En Praz des Gueux sits at 159 km, about halfway. Next is back through Rütte.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rütte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Rütte comes up about 209 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Old City of Berne.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Old City of Berne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 243 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Old City of Berne. Next is back through Burgäschisee Ost.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Burgäschisee Ost write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Burgäschisee Ost, late in the day. Next is Egolzwil 3.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Egolzwil 3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 318 km.
Egolzwil 3 → Burgäschisee Ost is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Burgäschisee Ost → Old City of Berne is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Old City of Berne → Rütte is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Rütte → En Praz des Gueux is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
En Praz des Gueux → back through Rütte is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Rütte → back through Old City of Berne is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Old City of Berne → back through Burgäschisee Ost is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Burgäschisee Ost → Egolzwil 3 is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.