CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. 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.
83 km from Kraków to Kraków, about 1 h 42 of riding. The stops in between: Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka, Salt Mine in Bochnia and back through Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 17 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Every hour, a trumpeter plays a short melody from the taller tower of St Mary's Basilica on Kraków's market square, and every time the tune breaks off abruptly mid-phrase. Legend says it commemorates a watchman shot by a Tatar arrow in the throat as he sounded the alarm in the thirteenth century, and the hejnał has been played that way ever since, broadcast daily on Polish radio at noon. It is a fitting introduction to a city that wears its history so openly. The Rynek Główny, the main square, is one of the largest medieval squares in Europe, with the Renaissance Cloth Hall in the middle, and the historic centre, including Wawel Hill and the Jewish quarter of Kazimierz, was among the first sites ever placed on the UNESCO list in 1978.
Read the complete Historic Centre of Kraków write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Historic Centre of Kraków is where the day begins. Next is Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka.
Wieliczka is a town that sits on top of a vanished sea. Millions of years ago, this part of southern Poland lay under a shallow, salty basin, and as the water evaporated it left thick beds of rock salt, which people have mined for about seven hundred years. The Saltworks Castle, the Żupny Castle, was the administrative heart of the business, a medieval fortified complex that housed the managers, the accounts and the royal officers who ran one of the richest enterprises in Poland, since salt was money. For centuries the revenue from Wieliczka and neighbouring Bochnia paid a significant share of the Crown's expenses.
Read the complete Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka comes up 26 km in. Next is Salt Mine in Bochnia.
People were mining salt at Bochnia by the middle of the thirteenth century, which makes it the oldest salt mine in Poland and one of the oldest in Europe still open to visitors. For centuries the salt from here and from Wieliczka, about twenty-five kilometres to the west, filled the coffers of the Polish kings; at times it accounted for a remarkable share of the royal income. Together the two mines and the royal castle at Wieliczka form a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Read the complete Salt Mine in Bochnia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
51 km in you reach Salt Mine in Bochnia. Next is back through Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka, late in the day. Next is Historic Centre of Kraków.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Historic Centre of Kraków write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Historic Centre of Kraków. That is the ride.
Historic Centre of Kraków → Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka → Salt Mine in Bochnia is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Salt Mine in Bochnia → back through Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Saltworks Castle in Wieliczka → Historic Centre of Kraków is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.