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 Horw it runs 200 km to Horw; allow about 3 h 13 of riding. It goes by way of Sumpf, Enge Alpenquai, Robenhausen and back through Enge Alpenquai. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 41 km this is Lake Lucerne Axenstrasse, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Kehrsiten is a small settlement on the southern shore of Lake Lucerne, at the foot of the Bürgenstock, a steep, forested ridge that juts out into the lake, and it feels almost cut off from the rest of Switzerland. A narrow road follows the shore from Stansstad, squeezed between the rocks and the water, and ends here; beyond, the cliffs of the Bürgenstock drop straight into the lake. For most visitors, Kehrsiten is the place where the boat from Lucerne stops and the Bürgenstock funicular begins, climbing steeply through the forest to the resort on top, which has been welcoming guests since the late nineteenth century.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kehrsiten is where the day begins. Next is Sumpf.
Zug-Sumpf was a Bronze Age village on the northern shore of Lake Zug, near the mouth of the river Lorze between Cham and Steinhausen, and the waterlogged ground preserved wooden floors, posts and objects for over three thousand years. Excavations in the twentieth century recovered pottery, bronze tools and even remains of food, and the site sits on the World Heritage list as part of the prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps. Some of the finds are displayed in the museum of prehistory in Zug. Today the site lies under modern buildings and meadows, and only the name, which means swamp, recalls its watery origin.
Read the complete Sumpf write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sumpf comes up about 41 km into the recorded legs. Next is Enge Alpenquai.
Zurich's lakefront is one of the most pleasant urban shorelines in Europe, and the Alpenquai, in the district of Enge, is a stretch of it where the city opens up to views across the water to the Alps. On a clear day, especially when the föhn blows from the south, the peaks of the Glarus Alps seem close enough to touch. Under the water off this shore, archaeologists have found the remains of prehistoric villages built on piles along the lake edge, and several of Zurich's shore sites were inscribed in 2011 among the prehistoric pile dwellings of the Alpine lakes. You will see nothing of them from the promenade; they lie in the mud of the lake bed, preserved by the water.
Read the complete Enge Alpenquai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 71 km into the recorded legs you reach Enge Alpenquai. Next is Robenhausen.
In 1858 a local man named Jakob Messikommer began digging in the peat bog at Robenhausen, on the southern end of the Pfäffikersee in the Zurich Oberland, and he spent decades uncovering a remarkably rich Neolithic pile-dwelling settlement. His finds, from stone axes to woven textiles and charred bread, travelled to museums around the world and helped make Swiss lake dwellings famous. Today Robenhausen is one of the components of the UNESCO Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, though what remains lies underground in a protected wetland.
Read the complete Robenhausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Robenhausen, about halfway. Next is back through Enge Alpenquai.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Enge Alpenquai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Enge Alpenquai sits at 111 km, about halfway. Next is back through Sumpf.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sumpf write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Sumpf comes up about 159 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kehrsiten.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kehrsiten closes the day.
Kehrsiten → Sumpf is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sumpf → Enge Alpenquai is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Enge Alpenquai → Robenhausen is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Robenhausen → back through Enge Alpenquai is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Enge Alpenquai → back through Sumpf is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sumpf → Kehrsiten is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.