Why this ride
A 124 km round trip from Piadena - roughly 2 h 18 in the saddle. It goes by way of Sabbioneta, Mantua and Sabbioneta and back through Sabbioneta.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Lagazzi del Vho and Mantua and Sabbioneta
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 124 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 2 h 18
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Lagazzi del Vho
Four thousand years ago people built a village on stilts at the edge of a marsh here, and the muck preserved it. The Lagazzi del Vho site, near Piadena in the Po plain, was a Bronze Age settlement raised on wooden piles above a wetland, and thousands of its timbers, pots and tools lay waterlogged in the mud until archaeologists recovered them. It is one of the prehistoric pile dwelling sites around the Alps that UNESCO listed in 2011, and Italy has several. You will not see houses, since the evidence lies buried, but you will see a flat green plain that was once water, and a good museum in the town explains the finds.
Read the complete Lagazzi del Vho write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Lagazzi del Vho is where the day begins. Next is Sabbioneta.
2. Sabbioneta
Sabbioneta is a Renaissance experiment: a whole town built from scratch in the second half of the sixteenth century by Vespasiano Gonzaga, a soldier, scholar and minor prince of the great Mantuan family, who wanted a capital laid out according to the ideals of the age. He got it. Inside its star-shaped walls the streets run in a regular grid, and in a few hundred metres you pass a ducal palace, a long gallery built to show off his collection of ancient sculpture, a summer palace, and one of the earliest purpose-built theatres in Europe, the Teatro all'Antica, designed by Vincenzo Scamozzi. Sabbioneta and Mantua were listed together by UNESCO in 2008 as two contrasting visions of the Renaissance city.
Read the complete Sabbioneta write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Sabbioneta comes up about 25 km into the recorded legs. Next is Mantua and Sabbioneta.
3. Mantua and Sabbioneta
Approach Mantua from the north across the causeway and you see why it was so hard to conquer: the city rises from water on three sides, encircled by lakes formed from the river Mincio, its domes and towers reflected in the still surface. For nearly four centuries it belonged to the Gonzaga family, who turned a marshy town into one of the most brilliant courts of the Renaissance, and Mantua is listed by UNESCO together with Sabbioneta, the small ideal city that a branch of the same family built some thirty kilometres away.
Read the complete Mantua and Sabbioneta write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 63 km into the recorded legs you reach Mantua and Sabbioneta. Next is back through Sabbioneta.
4. back through Sabbioneta
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sabbioneta write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Sabbioneta, late in the day. Next is Lagazzi del Vho.
5. Lagazzi del Vho
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Lagazzi del Vho write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at Lagazzi del Vho. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
Lagazzi del Vho to Sabbioneta
Lagazzi del Vho → Sabbioneta is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sabbioneta to Mantua and Sabbioneta
Sabbioneta → Mantua and Sabbioneta is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Mantua and Sabbioneta to back through Sabbioneta
Mantua and Sabbioneta → back through Sabbioneta is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sabbioneta to Lagazzi del Vho
back through Sabbioneta → Lagazzi del Vho is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.