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.
423 km from Mérida to Mérida, about 5 h 43 of riding. On the way it passes Old Town of Cáceres, Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalup and back through Old Town of Cáceres. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 83 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Mérida was founded in 25 BC as Emerita Augusta, a retirement town for veterans of the legions, and it became the capital of the Roman province of Lusitania. It is still, for my money, the best place in Spain to feel the Roman world, because the monuments are not locked away in a museum but scattered through a living town: a theatre, an amphitheatre, a circus, a long stone bridge across the Guadiana, a temple and the great aqueduct of Los Milagros. UNESCO listed the whole ensemble in 1993.
Read the complete Los Milagros Aqueduct write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Los Milagros Aqueduct is where the day begins. Next is Old Town of Cáceres.
Cáceres has an old town so complete that film crews treat it as a ready-made set, and walking its streets at dusk, when the stone glows amber and the crowds have gone, you can see why. Inside the walls, built largely by the Almohads in the twelfth century, are dozens of fortified mansions, towers, churches and palaces, many built by noble families who made their fortunes in the conquest of the Americas. The towers once had battlements, but Queen Isabella ordered most of them cut down to curb the nobles' power. UNESCO listed the old town in 1986.
Read the complete Old Town of Cáceres write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Old Town of Cáceres comes up about 74 km into the recorded legs. Next is Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalup.
about 211 km into the recorded legs you reach Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalup. Next is back through Old Town of Cáceres.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Old Town of Cáceres write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Old Town of Cáceres, late in the day. Next is Los Milagros Aqueduct.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Los Milagros Aqueduct write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Los Milagros Aqueduct. That is the ride.
Los Milagros Aqueduct → Old Town of Cáceres is 74 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Old Town of Cáceres → Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalup is 137 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Royal Monastery of Santa María de Guadalup → back through Old Town of Cáceres is 138 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Old Town of Cáceres → Los Milagros Aqueduct is 74 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.