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 Gâlgău it runs 326 km to Gâlgău; allow about 6 h 05 of riding. It goes by way of Mirșid - Poguior, Gilău - La Castel and back through Mirșid - Poguior. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 950 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Strâmtură means a narrowing, and the name fits. Just outside Gâlgău, a small Sălaj village on the Someș, the valley pinches between wooded slopes, and the Roman frontier made use of exactly such pinch points to control movement along the river. The site listed as Valea Strâmturei belongs to that northern Dacian line, and like most of its neighbours it is earthwork and setting rather than standing masonry. You come for the geography and the sense of a border that ran through these quiet hills nearly two thousand years ago.
Read the complete Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei is where the day begins. Next is Mirșid - Poguior.
Mirșid sits on the southern flank of the Meseș Mountains, in the county of Sălaj, a few kilometres from Zalău, and it is almost within sight of one of the best Roman sites in Romania. Porolissum, on the ridge above the village of Moigrad, was the capital of the Roman province of Dacia Porolissensis and a great frontier post on the northern edge of the empire, with large military forts, an amphitheatre, a customs post and a town with temples and baths, built after Trajan's conquest of Dacia in the early second century AD. The site is now an archaeological park, with the outline of the fort on a spur and, below, an amphitheatre cut into the hillside, and from the walls you can look over the Meseș Gate, the pass the Romans were guarding.
Read the complete Mirșid - Poguior write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Mirșid - Poguior comes up about 76 km into the recorded legs. Next is Gilău - La Castel.
Gilău is a market village on the Someșul Mic, the first real settlement west of Cluj-Napoca on the road toward the Apuseni mountains, and the place name La Castel says it plainly: there was a fortification here, and there still is one, layered through the centuries. Under the later castle grounds, archaeologists found a Roman auxiliary fort guarding the valley route into Dacia from the west, and the medieval and early modern castle that followed sits on the same strategic ground. Rome, Hungarian nobles and later owners all made the same calculation about this spot.
Read the complete Gilău - La Castel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 163 km into the recorded legs you reach Gilău - La Castel. Next is back through Mirșid - Poguior.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Mirșid - Poguior write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Mirșid - Poguior, late in the day. Next is Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei. That is the ride.
Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei → Mirșid - Poguior is 76 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Mirșid - Poguior → Gilău - La Castel is 87 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Gilău - La Castel → back through Mirșid - Poguior is 87 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Mirșid - Poguior → Gâlgău - Valea Strâmturei is 76 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.