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.
301 km from Lutry to Lutry, about 4 h 58 of riding. It goes by way of La Bessime, Forêt de la Bettlachstock and back through La Bessime. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,150 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
82 km on Grand Tour of Switzerland.
From the shore of Lake Geneva the vineyards of Lavaux climb almost vertically, terrace upon terrace, held up by stone walls, to villages perched on the slopes above. Monks from Cistercian abbeys began shaping these hillsides in the Middle Ages, and generations of winegrowers have rebuilt the walls ever since, carrying soil back up when rain washes it down. The result is one of the most striking wine landscapes in the world, stretching about thirty kilometres between Lausanne and Montreux, and listed by UNESCO in 2007. Locals like to say that the vines here enjoy three suns: the one in the sky, its reflection off the lake and the warmth stored in the stone walls.
Read the complete Lavaux write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Lavaux is where the day begins. Next is La Bessime.
Lake Neuchâtel is the largest lake entirely within Switzerland, a long, narrow body of water at the foot of the Jura mountains, and its shallow shores have been home to people for thousands of years. La Bessime is one of the prehistoric pile-dwelling sites of the lake, part of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, listed by UNESCO in 2011. Like most such sites, it lies underwater or buried in the lake bed, with the remains of wooden posts, tools, pottery and food preserved in the mud, invisible to the visitor but invaluable to archaeologists.
Read the complete La Bessime write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
La Bessime comes up about 57 km into the recorded legs. Next is Forêt de la Bettlachstock.
Above the watchmaking towns of Grenchen and Bettlach, the first chain of the Jura rises like a wall out of the Aare plain, and on its steep southern flank grows the beech forest of the Bettlachstock. In 2021 it became one of the Swiss components of the UNESCO Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe, a serial site that stretches across the continent to show how beech spread after the last Ice Age. What makes this patch special is that it has been left largely to itself for decades, on slopes so steep and rocky that nobody bothered to log them hard, and so the trees grow old, fall, rot and feed the next generation.
Read the complete Forêt de la Bettlachstock write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 139 km into the recorded legs you reach Forêt de la Bettlachstock. Next is back through La Bessime.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete La Bessime write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through La Bessime, late in the day. Next is Lavaux.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Lavaux write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Lavaux. That is the ride.
Lavaux → La Bessime is 57 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
La Bessime → Forêt de la Bettlachstock is 82 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Forêt de la Bettlachstock → back through La Bessime is 82 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through La Bessime → Lavaux is 81 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.