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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
From Kaesŏng it runs 246 km to Kaesŏng; allow about 4 h 14 of riding. The stops in between: Seosamreung Cluster, Hwaseong Fortress and back through Seosamreung Cluster. It crosses from North Korea into South Korea - carry ID and check the toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
On the slope of Songak mountain, a terrace of stone foundations and steps marks where the Koryo kings had their palace, known as Manwoldae, the moon-full terrace. The name suggests the beauty of the setting rather than the architecture, and the complex was largely destroyed by Red Turban invaders in 1361, so what survives is the platform and the stone staircases that climbed it. A few hundred metres away stands the Chomsongdae, a stone platform with stone supports that is traditionally described as an astronomical observatory, built in the Koryo period and used to watch the sky, though like many such claims, its exact use is a matter of scholarly discussion.
Read the complete Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae is where the day begins. Next is Seosamreung Cluster.
The kings and queens of the Joseon dynasty, who ruled Korea for more than five hundred years until 1910, chose their graves with enormous care. Geomancers studied hills, water and wind to find sites with the right energy, and the royal tombs were laid out with burial mounds, stone guardians, ceremonial halls and long processional paths. Forty of these tombs are listed together by UNESCO as the Royal Tombs of the Joseon Dynasty, and Seosamreung, the three western tombs in Goyang just north-west of Seoul, is one of the clusters.
Read the complete Seosamreung Cluster write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Seosamreung Cluster comes up about 62 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hwaseong Fortress.
Hwaseong is a love letter from a son to his father, written in stone. In 1762, Crown Prince Sado was locked in a rice chest by his own father, King Yeongjo, and left to die, one of the darkest episodes in Korean royal history. His son, who became King Jeongjo, never forgot, and he moved his father's tomb to a site near Suwon and built a grand fortress there, completed in 1796, intended perhaps as a new capital. The engineer and scholar Jeong Yak-yong used cranes and pulleys to speed up construction, and the walls, gates, towers and bastions combine Korean, Chinese and Western ideas of fortification. UNESCO listed it in 1997.
Read the complete Hwaseong Fortress write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 123 km into the recorded legs you reach Hwaseong Fortress. Next is back through Seosamreung Cluster.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Seosamreung Cluster write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Seosamreung Cluster, late in the day. Next is Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae. That is the ride.
Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae → Seosamreung Cluster is 62 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Seosamreung Cluster → Hwaseong Fortress is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hwaseong Fortress → back through Seosamreung Cluster is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Seosamreung Cluster → Manwoldae & Kaesong Chomsongdae is 62 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.