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.
317 km from Randburg to Randburg, about 5 h 06 of riding. On the way it passes 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West, Sterkfontein, Human Rights and back through Sterkfontein. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,650 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
In the early 1960s, Rivonia was a quiet farming area on the northern edge of Johannesburg, and Liliesleaf was a smallholding with a farmhouse, outbuildings and a thatched cottage. It was bought, through a front, by the South African Communist Party and used as a secret headquarters by the leadership of the liberation movement, including Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of the African National Congress. Nelson Mandela lived here for a time under a false name, posing as a worker called David Motsamayi. On 11 July 1963, police raided the farm and arrested much of the leadership, seizing documents that led to the Rivonia Trial, in which Mandela and others were sentenced to life imprisonment. Mandela's speech from the dock, declaring an ideal for which he was prepared to die, became one of the defining moments of the struggle against apartheid.
Read the complete Liliesleaf write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Liliesleaf is where the day begins. Next is 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West.
Orlando West looks ordinary at first: tidy brick houses, kids in school uniform, taxis hooting at every corner, smoke from braai stands curling over the street. It is in Soweto, about fifteen kilometres southwest of central Johannesburg, and on the morning of 16 June 1976 these were the streets where thousands of schoolchildren marched against being taught in Afrikaans. Police opened fire. Among the first killed was twelve-year-old Hector Pieterson, and the photograph of him being carried by an older student went around the world.
Read the complete 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West comes up about 37 km into the recorded legs. Next is Sterkfontein.
Some of the most important clues to human evolution have come out of a set of limestone caves in the grassland north-west of Johannesburg. The Sterkfontein caves, in the area known as the Cradle of Humankind, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, have yielded hundreds of hominin fossils, including Mrs Ples, a skull of Australopithecus africanus about two million years old, found in 1947, and Little Foot, an almost complete skeleton of an Australopithecus, painstakingly extracted from the rock over two decades.
Read the complete Sterkfontein write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 89 km into the recorded legs you reach Sterkfontein. Next is Human Rights.
Pretoria's Union Buildings stand on Meintjieskop, a low ridge looking over the city, and from the terraced gardens you can see the whole sweep of the South African capital spread out below. The sandstone buildings, with two wings joined by a curved colonnade, were designed by the English architect Herbert Baker and finished in 1913, to house the government of the newly formed Union of South Africa. For decades they were the seat of white minority rule. On 10 May 1994 they became the setting for the inauguration of Nelson Mandela as the first democratically elected president, and with that the meaning of the place changed.
Read the complete Human Rights write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Human Rights, about halfway. Next is back through Sterkfontein.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sterkfontein write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Sterkfontein sits at 197 km, about halfway. Next is back through 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West comes up about 282 km into the recorded legs. Next is Liliesleaf.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Liliesleaf write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Liliesleaf closes the day.
Liliesleaf → 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West → Sterkfontein is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sterkfontein → Human Rights is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Human Rights → back through Sterkfontein is 72 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sterkfontein → back through 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through 16 June 1976 - The Streets of Orlando West → Liliesleaf is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.