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.
From Elvas it runs 299 km to Elvas; allow about 4 h 17 of riding. The stops in between: Proserpina Dam, Thermal Baths at Alange, Alcantarilla Bridge and back through Thermal Baths at Alange. It crosses from Portugal into Spain - carry ID and check the toll rules. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 33 km this is Ruta de la Plata, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
The Fort of Graca sits on a hill north of Elvas, like a stone crown, and it was built after a lesson. In the 1750s and 1760s, Europe had been rocked by the Seven Years War, and Portugal, which had been dragged into conflict with Spain, found that its border defences were out of date. The government called in a foreign expert, the Count of Lippe, a German soldier of fortune and military reformer, who designed a new fortress on the highest hill overlooking the town. Work began in the 1760s and continued for decades, and the result was the most modern piece of the entire system, a fortress designed for the age of heavy artillery, with a star-shaped plan, deep ditches and underground galleries.
Read the complete Fort of Garça write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fort of Garça is where the day begins. Next is Proserpina Dam.
The Romans built dams in Spain on a scale that still surprises engineers, and Proserpina, a few kilometres north of Mérida, is one of the best preserved. It was built in the first or second century AD to store water for Emerita Augusta, the provincial capital, which was fed by aqueduct from the lake. The dam is a massive earthen embankment faced with stone and backed by huge buttresses, some four hundred metres long, and it has held water for roughly nineteen centuries with repairs. The reservoir, a long green lake in a landscape of holm oak and rock, is now a place where local people fish, swim and walk.
Read the complete Proserpina Dam write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Proserpina Dam comes up about 89 km into the recorded legs. Next is Thermal Baths at Alange.
The Romans, who were serious about hot water, found a warm spring at Alange in what is now Extremadura and built a bathing complex around it, and the place is still used today. The Roman baths, about twenty kilometres from Mérida, include a domed chamber with stone benches and a pool fed by the spring, and the water comes out pleasantly warm, a gift in a dry country. The baths date from the time when Mérida, then called Emerita Augusta, was one of the great cities of Roman Spain, and wealthy citizens would travel here to relax and be cured.
Read the complete Thermal Baths at Alange write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 122 km into the recorded legs you reach Thermal Baths at Alange. Next is Alcantarilla Bridge.
Mérida was founded by the Romans in 25 BC as Augusta Emerita, a city for veterans of the Cantabrian wars, and it grew into the capital of the province of Lusitania. Few places in Spain carry their Roman past so openly. The small Alcantarilla bridge on the edge of town is one piece of the Archaeological Ensemble of Mérida, listed by UNESCO in 1993, and its name, from the Arabic for little bridge, tells you how many hands this landscape has passed through. It is a quiet, unassuming structure, and that is a good reason to start here before you tackle the big sights.
Read the complete Alcantarilla Bridge write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Alcantarilla Bridge, about halfway. Next is back through Thermal Baths at Alange.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Thermal Baths at Alange write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Thermal Baths at Alange sits at 201 km, about halfway. Next is back through Proserpina Dam.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Proserpina Dam write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Proserpina Dam comes up about 211 km into the recorded legs. Next is Fort of Garça.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Fort of Garça write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fort of Garça closes the day.
Fort of Garça → Proserpina Dam is 89 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Proserpina Dam → Thermal Baths at Alange is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Thermal Baths at Alange → Alcantarilla Bridge is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Alcantarilla Bridge → back through Thermal Baths at Alange is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Thermal Baths at Alange → back through Proserpina Dam is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Proserpina Dam → Fort of Garça is 89 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.