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.
A 392 km round trip from Tangua - roughly 8 h 17 in the saddle. The stops in between: San Pedro, Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo, Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito and back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 3,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It crosses from Colombia into Ecuador - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
The Andes of southern Colombia look folded rather than carved, a series of green ridges one behind another until the cloud hides them, and Guapuscal Bajo sits in the middle of that country. The name means lower Guapuscal, which implies an upper one higher up the slope, and the pair are small farming settlements in the municipality of Tangua, in the department of Nariño. There is no famous landmark to point to here. The interest lies in the day-to-day landscape, in small terraced plots of potatoes, onions, maize and pasture, in the kids in uniform walking the lanes and the smoke rising from kitchen stoves.
Read the complete Guapuscal Bajo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Guapuscal Bajo is where the day begins. Next is San Pedro.
Ipiales is the last big Colombian town before Ecuador, and the high, cold plateau around it is some of the most dramatic farmland in the Andes. San Pedro lies a little north-west of the city, in a landscape of terraces, small farms and green slopes that tilt toward the canyon of the Guáitara river. The land is at about 2,900 metres and above, so mornings begin with frost on the grass and a hard blue sky.
Read the complete San Pedro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
San Pedro comes up about 65 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo.
Up in Carchi, Ecuador's northernmost province, a short stretch of old stone-edged road near San Gabriel is all that is left visible of something enormous. The Qhapaq Ñan, the Inca road system, ran from what is now southern Colombia to central Chile and Argentina, tens of thousands of kilometres of paths, stairways and causeways that tied the empire together. The segment between Mariscal Sucre and El Tambo is one of the pieces listed by UNESCO in 2014 as part of that network. A tambo was a waystation, a place where runners and travellers could rest and resupply, so the name itself tells you what stood here.
Read the complete Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 126 km into the recorded legs you reach Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo. Next is Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito.
High in the Andes of northern Ecuador, between El Ángel and Pimampiro in the province of Carchi, a stretch of the Qhapaq Ñan, the great road network of the Inca Empire, crosses the páramo, the high grassland that blankets the mountains above the tree line. The Inca built more than thirty thousand kilometres of roads across their empire, from Colombia to Chile and Argentina, linking towns, temples and storehouses, and this northern section, near the empire's frontier, was among the last to be built before the Spanish conquest. The Qhapaq Ñan was inscribed on the UNESCO list in 2014 as a transnational site shared by six countries, with hundreds of individual segments, including this one.
Read the complete Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito, about halfway. Next is back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo sits at 181 km, about halfway. Next is back through San Pedro.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete San Pedro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through San Pedro comes up about 332 km into the recorded legs. Next is Guapuscal Bajo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Guapuscal Bajo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Guapuscal Bajo closes the day.
Guapuscal Bajo → San Pedro is 65 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
San Pedro → Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo → Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito → back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo → back through San Pedro is 62 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through San Pedro → Guapuscal Bajo is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.