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.
244 km from Molodezhnoye to Molodezhnoye, about 4 h 30 of riding. It goes by way of The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo, Northern battery No. 2, The Colonizer's Park and back through Northern battery No. 2. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 40 km this is Saint Petersburg Imperial Shore, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
In pine woods on the northern shore of the Gulf of Finland, west of the resort strip of Zelenogorsk, lie the shattered concrete remains of Fort Ino. It was built from 1909 as part of the defences of Saint Petersburg, a key battery of Peter the Great's Naval Fortress, designed to close the gulf to enemy fleets with heavy guns. When Finland became independent, the fort ended up on Finnish territory, and under the Treaty of Tartu in 1920 its fortifications were to be dismantled, which is why what remains today is mostly blasted concrete, scattered among the trees and dunes.
Read the complete Fort «Ino» write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fort «Ino» is where the day begins. Next is The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo.
Anna Akhmatova is buried here. The cemetery of Komarovo is a small, quiet graveyard among pines on the Karelian Isthmus, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland about forty kilometres north-west of Saint Petersburg, and her grave, a simple stone with a cross, is the one that people come to find. She died in 1966, and loved the little cottage she was given in the village, which she called her Booth. The cemetery also holds the grave of the scholar Dmitry Likhachev, and a scattering of writers, artists and scientists who spent their summers in this dacha colony, once reserved for the Soviet cultural elite.
Read the complete The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Northern battery No. 2, 25 km on.
Forts are places for people who like their history with a view of the sea, and Kotlin island has more of them than most. Northern Battery No. 2 is part of the chain of defences that guarded the northern channel into the Gulf of Finland, and it dates from the great programme of fortification that Russia undertook in the nineteenth century to protect Kronstadt and, behind it, the capital. The batteries line the island's northern shore, low, squat and half buried in the pines.
Read the complete Northern battery No. 2 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 74 km into the recorded legs you reach Northern battery No. 2. Next is The Colonizer's Park.
Peterhof sits on the south shore of the Gulf of Finland, about half an hour's ride west of central Saint Petersburg when the traffic behaves, and the Colonists' Park is one of its quieter green corners. Most visitors come for the Grand Cascade and the gilded fountains of the Lower Park and never notice that the wider Peterhof estate is a patchwork of separate gardens laid out by different tsars over a couple of centuries. This one belongs to the later, more relaxed layer: lawns, big trees, ponds and paths meant for strolling rather than for impressing ambassadors.
Read the complete The Colonizer's Park write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The Colonizer's Park, about halfway. Next is back through Northern battery No. 2, 25 km on.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Northern battery No. 2 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Northern battery No. 2 sits at 101 km, about halfway. Next is back through The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo comes up about 210 km into the recorded legs. Next is Fort «Ino».
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Fort «Ino» write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fort «Ino» closes the day.
Fort «Ino» → The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo → Northern battery No. 2 is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Northern battery No. 2 → The Colonizer's Park is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Colonizer's Park → back through Northern battery No. 2 is 49 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Northern battery No. 2 → back through The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The Cemetery of the Village of Komarovo → Fort «Ino» is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.