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.
439 km from Contadero to Contadero, about 8 h 08 of riding. It goes by way of Guapuscal Bajo, Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo, Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito and back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 3,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It crosses from Colombia into Ecuador - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
There are several places named La Paz in Colombia, and this one is a small settlement in the department of Nariño, near the town of Contadero, in the high country close to the Ecuadorian border. Nariño is the land of the Pastos, the indigenous people who farmed these cold uplands before the Inca arrived, and it lies on the Qhapaq Ñan, the Inca road system that UNESCO listed in 2014. The road here follows the route that ran north from Quito toward Pasto, crossing deep canyons and high plateaus, and the old Inca line is part of the story of a landscape where cultures have met and mixed for centuries.
Read the complete La Paz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
La Paz is where the day begins. Next is Guapuscal Bajo.
The Andes of southern Colombia look folded rather than carved, a series of green ridges one behind another until the cloud hides them, and Guapuscal Bajo sits in the middle of that country. The name means lower Guapuscal, which implies an upper one higher up the slope, and the pair are small farming settlements in the municipality of Tangua, in the department of Nariño. There is no famous landmark to point to here. The interest lies in the day-to-day landscape, in small terraced plots of potatoes, onions, maize and pasture, in the kids in uniform walking the lanes and the smoke rising from kitchen stoves.
Read the complete Guapuscal Bajo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Guapuscal Bajo comes up about 41 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo.
Up in Carchi, Ecuador's northernmost province, a short stretch of old stone-edged road near San Gabriel is all that is left visible of something enormous. The Qhapaq Ñan, the Inca road system, ran from what is now southern Colombia to central Chile and Argentina, tens of thousands of kilometres of paths, stairways and causeways that tied the empire together. The segment between Mariscal Sucre and El Tambo is one of the pieces listed by UNESCO in 2014 as part of that network. A tambo was a waystation, a place where runners and travellers could rest and resupply, so the name itself tells you what stood here.
Read the complete Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 148 km into the recorded legs you reach Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo. Next is Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito.
High in the Andes of northern Ecuador, between El Ángel and Pimampiro in the province of Carchi, a stretch of the Qhapaq Ñan, the great road network of the Inca Empire, crosses the páramo, the high grassland that blankets the mountains above the tree line. The Inca built more than thirty thousand kilometres of roads across their empire, from Colombia to Chile and Argentina, linking towns, temples and storehouses, and this northern section, near the empire's frontier, was among the last to be built before the Spanish conquest. The Qhapaq Ñan was inscribed on the UNESCO list in 2014 as a transnational site shared by six countries, with hundreds of individual segments, including this one.
Read the complete Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito, about halfway. Next is back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo sits at 221 km, about halfway. Next is back through Guapuscal Bajo.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Guapuscal Bajo write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Guapuscal Bajo comes up about 391 km into the recorded legs. Next is La Paz.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete La Paz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
La Paz closes the day.
La Paz → Guapuscal Bajo is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Guapuscal Bajo → Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo is 107 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo → Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Loma Virgen - Chiquito → back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Mariscal Sucre - El Tambo → back through Guapuscal Bajo is 99 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Guapuscal Bajo → La Paz is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.