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.
From Nanxun it runs 342 km to Nanxun; allow about 5 h 19 of riding. The stops in between: Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal, Area of Yaoshan Site, West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou and Area of City Site. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Slow enough to look. The surface follows the shoreline, so the corners arrive where the water decided, not where an engineer did. Water arrives beside the road and stays for 33 km. The line follows the shore because there is nowhere else for it to go.
Nanxun is one of the water towns of the Yangtze delta, south of Lake Tai, where life has revolved around canals for more than a thousand years. In the nineteenth century, it became immensely rich through the silk trade, and its merchant families, known by nicknames like the four elephants and the eight bulls, built mansions that mixed Chinese courtyards with European columns, stained glass and Western-style furniture, an unusual blend you will not find in many other water towns. The canal running through the town is part of the Grand Canal, the immense waterway linking Beijing with Hangzhou, which UNESCO listed in 2014.
Read the complete Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal is where the day begins. Next is Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal.
The Grand Canal of China is the longest artificial waterway in the world, a chain of canals and rivers linking Beijing with Hangzhou that was begun in sections well over two thousand years ago and unified under the Sui dynasty in the seventh century. Its southernmost stretch, the Jiangnan Canal, crosses the flat, watery plain between Jiaxing and Hangzhou, and this section is part of the UNESCO World Heritage site. Grain, silk and salt moved north along it for centuries, and the towns that line its banks grew rich on that traffic.
Read the complete Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal comes up about 42 km into the recorded legs. Next is Area of Yaoshan Site.
Five thousand years ago, on the plain north of Hangzhou, people built a city with a water system so sophisticated that archaeologists still marvel at it. This is the Liangzhu culture, and the Yaoshan site is one of its most intriguing pieces, thought to be a ritual platform where elites took part in ceremonies and where beautifully worked jades were buried. The Liangzhu people carved jade into discs called bi and tubes known as cong, with delicate, mask-like faces, and these objects were symbols of status and belief. The whole Liangzhu complex has been a UNESCO site since 2019.
Read the complete Area of Yaoshan Site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 100 km into the recorded legs you reach Area of Yaoshan Site. Next is West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou.
There is a Chinese saying that in heaven there is paradise, and on earth there are Suzhou and Hangzhou. The West Lake, on the western edge of Hangzhou, has inspired poets, painters and garden designers for more than a thousand years, and its blend of water, hills, causeways, pagodas and temples became a model for landscape gardens across China, Japan and Korea. UNESCO inscribed it as a cultural landscape in 2011. The Su causeway, built by the poet-governor Su Dongpo in the eleventh century, and the Bai causeway, named after the Tang poet Bai Juyi, cross the lake, lined with willows and peach trees.
Read the complete West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou, about halfway. Next is Area of City Site.
Five thousand years ago, on the plain south of Lake Tai, a society built a city without metal tools. Liangzhu, now in the suburbs of Hangzhou, was a centre of a culture that carved jade into ritual objects, tubes called cong and discs called bi, and that grew rice in irrigated fields, and that built a complex water system of dams, dikes and canals, on a scale that no one expected from a Neolithic culture. UNESCO listed the Archaeological Ruins of Liangzhu City in 2019, and the entry covers the city walls, the palace area, the waterworks and the burial grounds of the elite.
Read the complete Area of City Site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Area of City Site sits at 170 km, about halfway. Next is back through West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou comes up about 204 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Area of Yaoshan Site.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Area of Yaoshan Site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 241 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Area of Yaoshan Site. Next is back through Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal, late in the day. Next is Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 342 km.
Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal → Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal → Area of Yaoshan Site is 58 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Area of Yaoshan Site → West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou → Area of City Site is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Area of City Site → back through West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through West Lake Cultural Landscape of Hangzhou → back through Area of Yaoshan Site is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Area of Yaoshan Site → back through Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal is 58 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Jiaxing-Hangzhou Section of Jiangnan Canal → Nanxun Section of Jiangnan Canal is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.