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.
355 km from Arad to Arad, about 5 h 50 of riding. It goes by way of Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town, Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud, Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer and back through Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud. It crosses from Israel into Palestinian Territories - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 44 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
The Dead Sea lies more than four hundred metres below sea level, the lowest point on land, and Masada rises above its western shore as a vast flat-topped rock with sheer cliffs on every side. King Herod built a palace fortress here in the first century BC, with storerooms, cisterns, bathhouses and a three-tiered palace hanging from the northern cliff. After the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in AD 70, a group of Jewish rebels held out on the rock against the Roman army. The Romans built a siege ramp up the western side, and according to the historian Josephus, when the walls were breached, the defenders chose to die rather than be captured.
Read the complete Masada write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Masada is where the day begins. Next is Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town.
Hebron, al-Khalil in Arabic, is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the Middle East, set in the hills of the southern West Bank. Its heart is the old town, a warren of stone alleys, covered souqs and Mamluk-era houses, grouped around the great mosque built over the Cave of the Patriarchs, where tradition places the tombs of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their wives. The site is holy to Muslims, Jews and Christians, and its name in Arabic, al-Khalil, means the friend, a reference to Abraham as the friend of God.
Read the complete Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town comes up about 75 km into the recorded legs. Next is Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud.
Beneath the low hills of the Judean lowlands, the Shephelah, lies a city of caves. Maresha was an important town of the Iron Age and the Hellenistic period, and its inhabitants carved thousands of chambers into the soft chalk beneath their houses: cisterns, olive presses, stables, quarries, burial caves and columbaria, rooms with hundreds of niches, probably used for raising pigeons. Nearby Bet Guvrin, known to the Romans as Eleutheropolis, became a major city in later centuries. The national park and its caves were listed by UNESCO in 2014 as a microcosm of the land of the caves.
Read the complete Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 104 km into the recorded legs you reach Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud. Next is Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer.
Saint Hilarion was born around 291 in a village near Gaza and grew up to be the founder of monasticism in Palestine. He studied in Alexandria, was inspired by the desert hermit Anthony, and returned home to live a life of such strict simplicity that disciples followed him and settled around him. The monastery that grew up here, at the site known today as Tell Umm Amer, became one of the largest in the Middle East, with churches, a bathhouse, hostels and workshops, and it functioned for several centuries until the seventh century. Hilarion himself eventually left, wandered through Egypt, Sicily and Dalmatia and died in Cyprus around 371, but the monastery kept his name.
Read the complete Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer, about halfway. Next is back through Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud sits at 194 km, about halfway. Next is back through Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town comes up about 280 km into the recorded legs. Next is Masada.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Masada write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Masada closes the day.
Masada → Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town → Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud → Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer is 73 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Saint Hilarion Monastery/ Tell Umm Amer → back through Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud is 71 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Caves of Maresha and Bet-Guvrin in the Jud → back through Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town → Masada is 75 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.