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.
316 km from Echzell to Echzell, about 5 h 00 of riding. The stops in between: Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456, Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl, Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha and Watchtower WP 3/38*. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 35 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Echzell is a village of a few thousand people in the Wetterau, the broad, fertile basin north-east of Frankfurt, where loess soil has been farmed since the Stone Age and the horizon rarely rises above a gentle swell. The Romans liked it for exactly that reason. They built a fort at Echzell in the later first century as part of their push into the Wetterau, and a civil settlement grew up around it in the usual way, with traders, craftsmen and families outside the gates. The fort later became part of the Upper German-Raetian Limes, which UNESCO listed in 2005. Almost nothing of the walls stands now, and the outline lies mostly under fields and houses, so the Echzell stop is about reading a landscape rather than visiting a monument.
Read the complete Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell is where the day begins. Next is Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456.
The Saalburg is the Roman fort that Germany rebuilt. On the crest of the Taunus north of Bad Homburg, where the Limes crossed a pass, archaeologists excavated the remains of a fort in the nineteenth century, and between 1897 and 1907, with the enthusiastic support of Kaiser Wilhelm II, it was reconstructed with walls, gates, barracks and a headquarters building. Today it is a museum and archaeological park, and the civil settlement, or vicus, that grew up outside the fort lies east of the B 456 road. It is part of the Upper German-Raetian Limes World Heritage Site.
Read the complete Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl.
Out here on the eastern rim of the Wetterau, between Altenstadt, Hammersbach and the Büdingen forest, the Roman frontier did something unusual. Having come over the Taunus and swung north around the fertile plain, the Limes turned and ran almost due south towards the Main, enclosing the Wetterau like a hand cupped around something precious. The towers numbered WP 4/82 to 5/8, along with small fortlets, guarded this eastern flank, and their remains lie in fields and woodland edges where only a shallow bank or a marker stone gives them away.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 69 km into the recorded legs you reach Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl. Next is Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha.
Elvis Presley spent his military service in Friedberg, a few kilometres from here, from 1958 to 1960, and lived in a rented house in the spa town of Bad Nauheim, where fans still leave messages on the wall outside and a square in the town bears his name. But nearly two thousand years earlier, other soldiers served in this region. The Roman frontier of the Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes, a World Heritage site, ran along the edge of the Taunus hills here, and at Langenhain, near Ober-Mörlen, the Romans built a fort with a civil settlement beside it, where traders, craftsmen and the families of soldiers lived. Today, the site is mostly fields and meadows, with information boards to help you imagine the walls, gates and buildings that once stood here.
Read the complete Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha, about halfway. Next is Watchtower WP 3/38*.
The Taunus is a range of wooded hills north-west of Frankfurt, rising to 878 metres at the Großer Feldberg, and it has long been the city's playground, with forests, spa towns and winding roads. Through these hills ran the Upper Germanic Limes, the Roman frontier that stretched for over five hundred kilometres across Germany, and one of its watchtowers, numbered WP 3/38, stood near the village of Glashütten, close to Waldems and Königstein im Taunus.
Read the complete Watchtower WP 3/38* write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtower WP 3/38* sits at 140 km, about halfway. Next is back through Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha comes up about 193 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 248 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl. Next is back through Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456, late in the day. Next is Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 316 km.
Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell → Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 → Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl → Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha is 56 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha → Watchtower WP 3/38* is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtower WP 3/38* → back through Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Fort site and civil settlement of Langenha → back through Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtowers WP 4/82 to 5/8 including fortl → back through Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Civil settlement of Saalburg east of B 456 → Fortsite and civil settlement of Echzell is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.