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.
871 km from Chóra to Chóra, about 43 h 01 of riding. The stops in between: House of Virgin Mary, Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe and back through House of Virgin Mary. It crosses from Greece into Türkiye - carry ID and check the toll rules. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Samos was rich in the sixth century BC, and the Heraion is the proof. This was the sanctuary of Hera, queen of the gods, on the south coast of the island, near the sea and the plain where the airport now sits. The first temple here was among the largest of the Greek world, the work of the architects Rhoikos and Theodoros, and it was reputed to be the biggest temple ever built in Greece. It was never quite finished, and it was damaged by earthquake, but a single column still stands to its full height, which is why the site is known to visitors as the place of the lone column.
Read the complete Heraion of Samos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Heraion of Samos is where the day begins. Next is House of Virgin Mary.
High above Ephesus, on Bülbül Dağı, the Nightingale Mountain, there is a small stone house in a pine wood that Christian tradition, and a certain amount of nineteenth-century detective work, links with the last years of Mary. The story goes that John the Apostle brought her to Ephesus after the crucifixion. In the 1800s a German nun, Anne Catherine Emmerich, described the house in visions, and a French priest set out to find it and identified the ruins. The Catholic church has never officially declared it authentic, though several popes have visited, and both Christians and Muslims, who honour Mary as Meryem Ana, come to pray here. A wall outside is covered with folded notes and strips of cloth bearing wishes.
Read the complete House of Virgin Mary write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
House of Virgin Mary comes up about 296 km into the recorded legs. Next is Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe.
Bin Tepe means a thousand mounds, and the name is only a mild exaggeration. On a low ridge north of the Gediz river plain, a few kilometres from the shore of Lake Marmara, the kings and nobles of ancient Lydia were buried under hundreds of earth tumuli, some of them enormous. Lydia, with its capital at Sardis, was the kingdom of Croesus, whose name became a byword for wealth, and the first state in the world to mint coins from electrum, the natural gold and silver alloy washed down from the mountains. The mounds date mostly from the seventh to the sixth centuries BC, and they were the funeral monuments of a rich, confident civilisation.
Read the complete Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 431 km into the recorded legs you reach Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe. Next is back through House of Virgin Mary.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete House of Virgin Mary write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through House of Virgin Mary, late in the day. Next is Heraion of Samos.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Heraion of Samos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Heraion of Samos. That is the ride.
Heraion of Samos → House of Virgin Mary is 296 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
House of Virgin Mary → Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe is 135 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Lydian Tumuli of Bin Tepe → back through House of Virgin Mary is 143 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through House of Virgin Mary → Heraion of Samos is 297 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.