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 321 km round trip from Sursee - roughly 5 h 32 in the saddle. The stops in between: Kehrsiten, Seematte, Enge Alpenquai and Hurden Rosshorn. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
For about 41 km this is Lake Lucerne Axenstrasse, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it — expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
Water arrives beside the road and stays for 34 km. The line follows the shore because there is nowhere else for it to go. Slow enough to look. The surface follows the shoreline, so the corners arrive where the water decided, not where an engineer did.
At the northern tip of Lake Sempach, near the little town of Sursee in the canton of Lucerne, a small peninsula pushes into the water, and on and around it lie the remains of prehistoric lakeside settlements, part of the World Heritage site of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps. Nothing remains visible above ground, but under the water and in the wet soil of the shore, piles and objects have survived for thousands of years, telling the story of farmers and fishermen who lived here long before the Romans. Today, the shore is a quiet area of reeds, meadows and paths, popular with walkers and cyclists.
Read the complete Halbinsel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Halbinsel is where the day begins. Next is Kehrsiten.
Kehrsiten is a small settlement on the southern shore of Lake Lucerne, at the foot of the Bürgenstock, a steep, forested ridge that juts out into the lake, and it feels almost cut off from the rest of Switzerland. A narrow road follows the shore from Stansstad, squeezed between the rocks and the water, and ends here; beyond, the cliffs of the Bürgenstock drop straight into the lake. For most visitors, Kehrsiten is the place where the boat from Lucerne stops and the Bürgenstock funicular begins, climbing steeply through the forest to the resort on top, which has been welcoming guests since the late nineteenth century.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kehrsiten comes up about 41 km into the recorded legs. Next is Seematte.
Lake Baldegg lies in the Seetal, the lake valley north of Lucerne, a gentle, green landscape of meadows, orchards and woods, with the lake in the middle and the hills rising on either side. Seematte, on the shore near Hitzkirch, is the site of prehistoric lakeside villages, built on piles over the water's edge thousands of years ago, and it was inscribed in the same 2011 listing that covers lakeside villages from France to Slovenia. As with most such sites, there is nothing to see above ground, but the setting is lovely, and standing on the reedy shore you can imagine the wooden houses and dugout canoes.
Read the complete Seematte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 80 km into the recorded legs you reach Seematte. Next is Enge Alpenquai.
Zurich's lakefront is one of the most pleasant urban shorelines in Europe, and the Alpenquai, in the district of Enge, is a stretch of it where the city opens up to views across the water to the Alps. On a clear day, especially when the föhn blows from the south, the peaks of the Glarus Alps seem close enough to touch. Under the water off this shore, archaeologists have found the remains of prehistoric villages built on piles along the lake edge, and several of Zurich's shore sites were inscribed in 2011 among the prehistoric pile dwellings of the Alpine lakes. You will see nothing of them from the promenade; they lie in the mud of the lake bed, preserved by the water.
Read the complete Enge Alpenquai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Enge Alpenquai, about halfway. Next is Hurden Rosshorn.
Where Lake Zurich narrows to a waist between Rapperswil and Hurden, a low peninsula runs out from the Schwyz shore, and at its tip, the Rosshorn, the remains of prehistoric lakeside villages lie beneath the shallow water. People lived here in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, in houses built on wooden piles, and they also built some of the earliest known bridges across the narrows. The site is one of the prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps that UNESCO listed in 2011, a group of sites that has given archaeologists a remarkably detailed view of everyday life thousands of years ago, preserved in the mud of lakes and moors.
Read the complete Hurden Rosshorn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hurden Rosshorn sits at 141 km, about halfway. Next is back through Enge Alpenquai.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Enge Alpenquai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Enge Alpenquai comes up about 200 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Seematte.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Seematte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 241 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Seematte. Next is back through Kehrsiten.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Kehrsiten, late in the day. Next is Halbinsel.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Halbinsel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 321 km.
Halbinsel → Kehrsiten is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Kehrsiten → Seematte is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Seematte → Enge Alpenquai is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Enge Alpenquai → Hurden Rosshorn is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hurden Rosshorn → back through Enge Alpenquai is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Enge Alpenquai → back through Seematte is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Seematte → back through Kehrsiten is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Kehrsiten → Halbinsel is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.