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 el Baix Guinardó it runs 138 km to el Baix Guinardó; allow about 2 h 20 of riding. On the way it passes Crypt at the Colònia Güell, Cova dels Segarulls and back through Crypt at the Colònia Güell. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 22 km this is Monserrat Mountain Road, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
There is a hill in Barcelona that most visitors reach by accident, on the walk from the Sagrada Família down a long avenue named after Gaudí. At the end of it stands the Hospital de Sant Pau, one of the greatest works of Catalan Modernisme, designed by Lluís Domènech i Montaner and built between 1902 and 1930 with money left by a banker called Pau Gil. The architect rejected the idea of a single block. Instead he built a garden city of pavilions, joined by underground tunnels, each with brick walls, tiled roofs and mosaics, so that patients could look out on trees and sky. It worked as a hospital until 2009, and has since been restored as a museum and cultural centre. UNESCO listed it in 1997 together with the Palau de la Música Catalana, also by Domènech.
Read the complete Hospital de Sant Pau write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hospital de Sant Pau is where the day begins. Next is Crypt at the Colònia Güell.
Few people ride out of Barcelona expecting to find Gaudí in a mill village, but that is exactly what waits at Santa Coloma de Cervelló, a short hop up the Llobregat from Sant Boi. The Colònia Güell was a textile colony founded by the industrialist Eusebi Güell, who moved his cotton works out of the city in the 1890s and built housing, a school, shops and a theatre for the workers around the factory. He asked his friend Antoni Gaudí for a church. Gaudí spent about ten years on the design and its foundations, and when money and the Güell family's enthusiasm ran out around 1914, only the lower level had been finished. That crypt is what you come to see.
Read the complete Crypt at the Colònia Güell write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Crypt at the Colònia Güell comes up about 22 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cova dels Segarulls.
The vineyards of the Penedès roll out in every direction from Vilafranca, and the Cova dels Segarulls lies among them, a few kilometres outside the town in the low hills toward the coastal range.
Read the complete Cova dels Segarulls write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 69 km into the recorded legs you reach Cova dels Segarulls. Next is back through Crypt at the Colònia Güell.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Crypt at the Colònia Güell write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Crypt at the Colònia Güell, late in the day. Next is Hospital de Sant Pau.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hospital de Sant Pau write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Hospital de Sant Pau. That is the ride.
Hospital de Sant Pau → Crypt at the Colònia Güell is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Crypt at the Colònia Güell → Cova dels Segarulls is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cova dels Segarulls → back through Crypt at the Colònia Güell is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Crypt at the Colònia Güell → Hospital de Sant Pau is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.