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 Xiamen it runs 387 km to Xiamen; allow about 5 h 11 of riding. The stops in between: Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu, Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang and back through Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Kulangsu, or Gulangyu, is a small island across a narrow strait from the city of Xiamen, and the first thing to know is that you will have to leave your motorcycle behind: no motor vehicles are allowed on the island apart from a few electric service carts. You get there by ferry, and that is part of the charm. Once on the island, the noise of the city disappears, replaced by the sound of footsteps on narrow lanes, birdsong and, quite often, piano music drifting from an open window. Kulangsu is known as the island of pianos, with a long tradition of music and a piano museum.
Read the complete Kulangsu write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kulangsu is where the day begins. Next is Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu.
Medieval travellers called it Zaitun, and to Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta it was one of the greatest ports in the world. Quanzhou, on the coast of Fujian facing Taiwan, flourished under the Song and Yuan dynasties as a hub of maritime trade, where Arab, Persian, Indian and Southeast Asian merchants lived alongside Chinese traders, and ships left laden with silk and porcelain. In 2021 UNESCO inscribed a group of sites as Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yuan China, including temples, mosques, tombs, kilns, bridges and docks that together tell the story of this cosmopolitan city.
Read the complete Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu comes up about 64 km into the recorded legs. Next is Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang.
In the green hills of Anxi county, inland from the port city of Quanzhou in Fujian, the Xiacaopu site preserves the remains of an iron industry that flourished during the Song and Yuan dynasties, roughly from the tenth to the fourteenth centuries. Archaeologists found furnaces, slag heaps, ore-roasting pits and workshops on a hillside, evidence of large-scale production. The iron produced here was shipped down the rivers to Quanzhou and exported to Southeast Asia and beyond, and that is why the site is part of the World Heritage listing of Quanzhou, Emporium of the World in Song-Yuan China, inscribed in 2021. At that time, Quanzhou was one of the largest ports in the world, visited by Arab, Persian and Indian merchants, and described by Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta.
Read the complete Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 194 km into the recorded legs you reach Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang. Next is back through Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu, late in the day. Next is Kulangsu.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kulangsu write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Kulangsu. That is the ride.
Kulangsu → Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu is 64 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu → Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang is 130 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Xiacaopu Iron Production Site of Qingyang → back through Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu is 136 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Quanzhou: Emporium of the World in Song-Yu → Kulangsu is 58 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.