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 265 km round trip from Stein am Rhein - roughly 5 h 46 in the saddle. It goes by way of Bleiche 2-3, Olzreute-Enzisholz and back through Bleiche 2-3. It crosses from Switzerland into Germany - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 53 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Where the Rhine leaves Lake Constance at Stein am Rhein, a group of small islands sits in the river, connected to the shore by a wooden footbridge, and on the largest, Werd, stands a small chapel surrounded by trees and water. It was here, in 759, that Saint Otmar, the first abbot of St Gallen, died in exile after falling foul of powerful local nobles, and the island has been a place of pilgrimage ever since. Long before Otmar, people lived here too: the islands and the surrounding shores are among the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, a World Heritage site, and excavations have found traces of settlements from the Neolithic onwards.
Read the complete Insel Werd write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Insel Werd is where the day begins. Next is Bleiche 2-3.
Arbon sits on the Swiss shore of Lake Constance, in the canton of Thurgau, and just outside the town, on land that was once lake shore, lies one of the most remarkable prehistoric sites in Europe. At Arbon-Bleiche, archaeologists excavated a Neolithic village of wooden houses built on the edge of the lake around 3400 BC. Because the wood was preserved in waterlogged ground, tree rings allowed the village to be dated almost to the year: it was built, lived in for about fifteen years and then destroyed by fire. The finds, from pottery and tools to textiles and food remains, gave a detailed picture of how these early farmers lived, and Arbon counts among the Swiss sites in the Alpine pile-dwelling inscription of 2011. There is nothing to see at the site itself, which is now under buildings and fields; the finds are displayed in the Thurgau archaeological museum in Frauenfeld.
Read the complete Bleiche 2-3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bleiche 2-3 comes up about 53 km into the recorded legs. Next is Olzreute-Enzisholz.
Some five thousand years ago, someone in Upper Swabia built a wheel out of a single maple plank, mounted it on an axle and used it to move loads across the soft ground near what is now Bad Schussenried. The wheel turned up during excavations at the moor settlement of Olzreute-Enzisholz and is among the oldest wheels ever found in Central Europe, dated to around 2900 BC. The settlement, a group of pile dwellings on the edge of a former lake, is one of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps listed by UNESCO in 2011, a transnational site across six countries.
Read the complete Olzreute-Enzisholz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 129 km into the recorded legs you reach Olzreute-Enzisholz. Next is back through Bleiche 2-3.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bleiche 2-3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Bleiche 2-3, late in the day. Next is Insel Werd.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Insel Werd write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Insel Werd. That is the ride.
Insel Werd → Bleiche 2-3 is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Bleiche 2-3 → Olzreute-Enzisholz is 76 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Olzreute-Enzisholz → back through Bleiche 2-3 is 82 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Bleiche 2-3 → Insel Werd is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.