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.
316 km from Qiryat Shemona to Qiryat Shemona, about 5 h 27 of riding. It goes by way of Ridván Gardens, Sebastia and back through Ridván Gardens. It crosses Lebanon, Israel and Palestinian Territories - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 61 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
It is a region of terraced slopes, olive groves, tobacco patches and stone villages, with the Hula valley falling away to the east and the long wall of Mount Hermon hanging over everything on a clear day. The nearest settlements are Ain Ebel on the Lebanese side and Qiryat Shemona and Metulla on the Israeli side, which tells you most of what you need to know about the place: this is a frontier, and the frontier shapes every road.
Read the complete Mount Amel Castles write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Mount Amel Castles is where the day begins. Next is Ridván Gardens.
In the spring of 1863, Bahá'u'lláh, the founder of the Bahá'í faith, spent twelve days in a garden in Baghdad that Bahá'ís now call Ridván, the Garden of Paradise, and the festival of that name still marks the most holy days in their calendar. The garden outside Acre that carries the same name is a different place, a quiet green island on the Na'amán river, east of the old city, which Bahá'u'lláh loved during his years as a prisoner and exile of the Ottomans in Acre. He called it the New Jerusalem, and visitors who enter its small gate understand why. The river runs around it, mulberry trees give shade, and the air is cool and smells of water.
Read the complete Ridván Gardens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ridván Gardens comes up about 61 km into the recorded legs. Next is Sebastia.
Sebastia, Sabastiya in Arabic, is a Palestinian village on a hill north-west of Nablus, in the northern West Bank, surrounded by olive groves and terraced hillsides. It stands on the site of Samaria, the capital of the northern Kingdom of Israel in the ninth and eighth centuries BC, later rebuilt by Herod the Great, who named it Sebaste in honour of the Emperor Augustus. The ruins on the hilltop above the village span a thousand years of history.
Read the complete Sebastia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 158 km into the recorded legs you reach Sebastia. Next is back through Ridván Gardens.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ridván Gardens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Ridván Gardens, late in the day. Next is Mount Amel Castles.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Mount Amel Castles write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Mount Amel Castles. That is the ride.
Mount Amel Castles → Ridván Gardens is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ridván Gardens → Sebastia is 97 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Sebastia → back through Ridván Gardens is 97 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Ridván Gardens → Mount Amel Castles is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.