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 292 km round trip from Jáchymov - roughly 5 h 42 in the saddle. It goes by way of Schindlers Werk Smalt Works, Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape, Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works and Freiberg Mining Landscape. It crosses from Czechia into Germany - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
The word dollar comes from this small town in the Ore Mountains. In the early sixteenth century, the silver mines of Jáchymov, then called Joachimsthal, were among the richest in Europe, and the coins minted here were called Joachimsthaler, shortened to thaler, which became daler and eventually dollar. The town grew rapidly, with thousands of miners, and it is now one component of the World Heritage inscription for the Erzgebirge mining region, shared between the Czech Republic and Germany. Its later history is darker and stranger.
Read the complete Jáchymov Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Jáchymov Mining Landscape is where the day begins. Next is Schindlers Werk Smalt Works.
In the Erzgebirge, the Ore Mountains of Saxony, a handful of workshops once produced a colour that conquered Europe. Schindlers Werk, at Zschorlau near Aue, was a smalt works, where cobalt ore from the surrounding mines was ground, roasted and fused with sand and potash into a deep blue glass, then milled into pigment. Smalt coloured Dutch tiles, German porcelain and painters' blues, and Saxony held an almost complete monopoly on it for generations. The works was founded in the seventeenth century and has been preserved as a museum.
Read the complete Schindlers Werk Smalt Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Schindlers Werk Smalt Works comes up about 39 km into the recorded legs. Next is Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape.
Tin, not silver, was the business of Ehrenfriedersdorf. For around eight hundred years miners dug into the Sauberg hill above this small Erzgebirge town for tin ore, and the Ehrenfriedersdorf mining landscape, with its shafts, spoil heaps, ponds and ditches, is one of the components of the Erzgebirge/Krušnohoří Mining Region World Heritage Site. The Sauberg visitor mine lets you go underground into galleries worked by generations of miners, and the hard hat, the damp cold and the drip of water make the history very physical.
Read the complete Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 71 km into the recorded legs you reach Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape. Next is Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works.
Down in the valley of the Flöha, on the edge of Olbernhau, stands an industrial village that looks almost too neat to be real: slate-roofed workshops, a hammer mill, workers' houses and a stout gatehouse, all enclosed within a wall. This is the Saigerhütte Grünthal, a works that separated silver from copper ore by a technique called liquation, and it is one of the best preserved sites of its kind in Europe. It forms part of the Erzgebirge/Krušnohoří Mining Region, listed by UNESCO in 2019 for both the German and Czech sides of the range.
Read the complete Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works, about halfway. Next is Freiberg Mining Landscape.
Silver was found near Freiberg in 1168, and within a few decades the town had become one of the richest in Saxony. For eight centuries, miners dug ever deeper into the hills, and the wealth they brought up paid for churches, palaces and the splendours of Dresden. Freiberg's Bergakademie, founded in 1765, is the oldest mining university in the world still operating, and its mineral collection is one of the finest anywhere. The town and its mining landscape are part of the Erzgebirge mining region listed by UNESCO, shared between Germany and the Czech Republic.
Read the complete Freiberg Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Freiberg Mining Landscape sits at 147 km, about halfway. Next is back through Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works comes up about 180 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 215 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape. Next is back through Schindlers Werk Smalt Works.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Schindlers Werk Smalt Works write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Schindlers Werk Smalt Works, late in the day. Next is Jáchymov Mining Landscape.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Jáchymov Mining Landscape write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 292 km.
Jáchymov Mining Landscape → Schindlers Werk Smalt Works is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Schindlers Werk Smalt Works → Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape → Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works → Freiberg Mining Landscape is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Freiberg Mining Landscape → back through Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Grünthal Silver-Copper Liquation Works → back through Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ehrenfriedersdorf Mining Landscape → back through Schindlers Werk Smalt Works is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Schindlers Werk Smalt Works → Jáchymov Mining Landscape is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.