Why this ride
An 88 km round trip from Desenzano del Garda - roughly 1 h 49 in the saddle. The stops in between: Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda, San Sivino and back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Lavagnone and San Sivino
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 88 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 1 h 49
- 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. Lavagnone
Lavagnone does not look like much, and that is rather the point. South of Lake Garda, behind Desenzano, the landscape is a rumple of low hills left by the glacier that once filled the lake basin, and in a hollow among them lies a small peat basin that was once a shallow lake. Around four thousand years ago, in the Bronze Age, people built houses on timber piles at its edge, and when the water level fell and the peat built up, the wood was preserved in the mud like a time capsule.
Read the complete Lavagnone write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Lavagnone is where the day begins. Next is Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda.
2. Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda
Water surrounds Peschiera on every side, and that was the whole idea. The town sits where the River Mincio flows out of the southern end of Lake Garda, and in the sixteenth century the Republic of Venice turned it into a star-shaped fortress with massive pentagonal walls, bastions and moats fed by the lake and the river. Later the Austrians made it one of the four corners of the Quadrilatero, the defensive square of fortresses that guarded their hold on northern Italy in the nineteenth century. In 2017 Peschiera became part of the UNESCO listing of Venetian works of defence between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, alongside Bergamo, Palmanova and fortresses on the Adriatic.
Read the complete Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda comes up about 17 km into the recorded legs. Next is San Sivino.
3. San Sivino
On the western shore of Lake Garda, between Manerba and Moniga, the little bay of San Sivino hides something very old under its shallows. People lived here in the Bronze Age in villages built on wooden piles at the water's edge, and the remains of their posts, tools and pottery survive in the mud of the lake. The site is one of the prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps that UNESCO listed in 2011, a series of more than a hundred sites spread across six countries. There is nothing to see above the water, but knowing that the shore was settled thousands of years ago adds a quiet depth to an afternoon by the lake.
Read the complete San Sivino write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 44 km into the recorded legs you reach San Sivino. Next is back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda.
4. back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda, late in the day. Next is Lavagnone.
5. Lavagnone
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Lavagnone write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at Lavagnone. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
Lavagnone to Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda
Lavagnone → Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda to San Sivino
Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda → San Sivino is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
San Sivino to back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda
San Sivino → back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda to Lavagnone
back through Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda → Lavagnone is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.