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.
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Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
689 km from Chaniá to Chaniá, about 13 h 03 of riding. It goes by way of Minoan Palatial Centres, Phaistos, Zominthos and Knossos. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 800 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Kydonia is the old name of Chania, and the city carries its past visibly. The Minoans had a settlement here on the Kastelli hill, above what became the Venetian harbour, and ancient writers mention Kydonia as one of the leading cities of Crete. The Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Venetians and Ottomans each left something on the same rocky ground, and today you find all of them stacked in the old town: Venetian palazzi, Ottoman mosques, a lighthouse at the end of the mole, and a harbour front lined with tavernas.
Read the complete Kydonia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kydonia is where the day begins. Next is Minoan Palatial Centres.
High on the northern flank of Psiloritis, the mountain the ancients called Ida, the road from Anogeia climbs onto a stony plateau, and at around 1,200 metres you come upon a Minoan building standing alone among the scrub and grazing goats. This is Zominthos, a large Bronze Age complex that excavations have shown to be more than a mountain shelter: it had dozens of rooms, workshops and storage spaces, and it sat on the ancient route toward the sacred Idaean Cave, where myth says Zeus was raised. In 2025 it was included with Knossos, Phaistos, Malia and others among the Minoan Palatial Centres listed by UNESCO, which gives you an idea of its importance.
Read the complete Minoan Palatial Centres write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Minoan Palatial Centres comes up about 129 km into the recorded legs. Next is Phaistos.
The Messara is Crete's largest plain, a broad, fertile trough between the Psiloritis range to the north and the low Asterousia hills to the south, and at its western end a long ridge rises above the valley of the Geropotamos river. On that ridge stood Phaistos, one of the great palaces of the Minoan civilisation, the culture that flourished in Crete in the second millennium BC. The first palace was built around 1900 BC and destroyed by an earthquake, and the second, rebuilt on top, was a larger and more graceful construction, with a broad staircase to the west court, storerooms, royal apartments and a central courtyard. The view alone makes the climb worth it, with Mount Ida snowy in spring on one side and the blue haze of the Libyan Sea on the other.
Read the complete Phaistos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 213 km into the recorded legs you reach Phaistos. Next is Zominthos.
Zominthos is a mountain meadow on the north-eastern shoulder of Mount Psiloritis, or Ida, the highest peak in Crete at 2,456 metres, and at about twelve hundred metres altitude it is cool, green and silent even in August. It was the site of a Minoan settlement, a large two-storey building of the middle Bronze Age, excavated from 1982 by the archaeologist Yiannis Sakellarakis, and the stone walls and rooms still stand among the grass. It was probably a way station on the path to the sacred Idaean Cave, where legend says the infant Zeus was hidden from his father Kronos and raised by nymphs and goats. A pilgrim route ran through here for thousands of years.
Read the complete Zominthos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zominthos, about halfway. Next is Knossos.
Five kilometres south of Heraklion, on a low hill above the Kairatos stream, lie the ruins that gave Europe its oldest legend of a labyrinth. Knossos was the greatest centre of Minoan Crete, a sprawling palace complex of courtyards, storerooms, staircases and shrines that flourished in the second millennium BC. Its confusing plan, with hundreds of interlocking rooms on several levels, may well have inspired the Greek myth of King Minos, the craftsman Daedalus and the Minotaur imprisoned in the maze, waiting for Theseus.
Read the complete Knossos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Knossos sits at 210 km, about halfway. Next is back through Zominthos.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Zominthos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Zominthos comes up about 390 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Phaistos.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Phaistos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 474 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Phaistos. Next is back through Minoan Palatial Centres.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Minoan Palatial Centres write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Minoan Palatial Centres, late in the day. Next is Kydonia.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kydonia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 689 km.
Kydonia → Minoan Palatial Centres is 129 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Minoan Palatial Centres → Phaistos is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Phaistos → Zominthos is 78 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Zominthos → Knossos is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Knossos → back through Zominthos is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Zominthos → back through Phaistos is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Phaistos → back through Minoan Palatial Centres is 78 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Minoan Palatial Centres → Kydonia is 137 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.