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.
220 km from Keda to Keda, about 4 h 59 of riding. On the way it passes Ispani, Grigoleti, Nabada and back through Grigoleti. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Adjara is the strangest corner of Georgia, a damp subtropical strip between the Black Sea and the Lesser Caucasus where tea and tangerines grow within sight of snow. Mtirala and Kintrishi are two neighbouring protected areas inland from Kobuleti and Chakvi, and they hold what is left of the Colchic forest, a relict of the lush woodland that covered this coast before the ice ages. Rainfall is among the highest in the country, and the hills are a tangle of beech, chestnut, alder, rhododendron and box, with ferns, lianas and moss on every branch. Mtirala means something like the weeping or the crying one in Georgian, a reference to the constant drizzle and mist, and you can see why.
Read the complete Kintrishi-Mtirala write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kintrishi-Mtirala is where the day begins. Next is Ispani.
Most of Georgia's Black Sea coast is subtropical, with tea plantations, citrus groves and lush forests, and on the plain near Kobuleti, between the sea and the hills, lies one of the strangest landscapes in the Caucasus. The Ispani mires are raised peat bogs, domes of sphagnum moss that have grown over thousands of years, fed only by rain, and they are among the few such bogs in the subtropics. They are part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the Colchic Rainforests and Wetlands, inscribed in 2021.
Read the complete Ispani write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ispani comes up about 30 km into the recorded legs. Next is Grigoleti.
Grigoleti is a strip of pine woods and black sand on Georgia's Black Sea coast, squeezed between the sea and the great reed beds of Lake Paliastomi, a few kilometres north of the resort of Ureki and a short hop south of the port of Poti. It is a holiday place for Georgian families rather than foreign tourists, with guesthouses among the trees, wooden cafés and a beach that stretches as far as you can see. The sand here, and even more at Ureki, is dark and magnetic, full of iron-rich minerals washed down from the mountains, and locals swear it does wonders for aching joints. After a long day in the saddle feel free to test the theory.
Read the complete Grigoleti write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 59 km into the recorded legs you reach Grigoleti. Next is Nabada.
Georgia's Black Sea coast has a wet, green corner that few people think of when they think of the Caucasus. The Rioni river, the ancient Phasis of the Greeks, empties into the sea here, and around its mouth lies the Kolkheti lowland, a flat, humid country of alder swamp, peat bog, reedbeds and shallow lakes. Lake Paliastomi lies just south of Poti, and the Colchic rainforests and wetlands, listed by UNESCO in 2021, preserve a remnant of the forests that once covered the whole plain. This is the land of Colchis, where the Argonauts came for the Golden Fleece, according to the myth, and on a misty morning with the trees draped in lianas it is easy to believe in it.
Read the complete Nabada write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nabada, about halfway. Next is back through Grigoleti.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Grigoleti write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Grigoleti sits at 117 km, about halfway. Next is back through Ispani.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ispani write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Ispani comes up about 191 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kintrishi-Mtirala.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kintrishi-Mtirala write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kintrishi-Mtirala closes the day.
Kintrishi-Mtirala → Ispani is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ispani → Grigoleti is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Grigoleti → Nabada is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nabada → back through Grigoleti is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Grigoleti → back through Ispani is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ispani → Kintrishi-Mtirala is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.