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.
A 263 km round trip from Nijmegen - roughly 3 h 29 in the saddle. On the way it passes Xanten-Fürstenberg, Neuss-Koenenlager and back through Xanten-Fürstenberg. It crosses from Netherlands into Germany - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Nijmegen calls itself the oldest city in the Netherlands, and it has a good case. The Romans founded a military camp on the hill here in the last years BC, and a town followed, which was given full town rights around AD 100. Many centuries later, on the same hill by the Waal, Charlemagne built a palace, the Valkhof, and Frederick Barbarossa rebuilt it in the twelfth century as a magnificent imperial residence. Little survives except for a chapel and a ruined apse, but the Valkhofpark, with its terraced slopes and view across the river, still marks the site of one of the most important places in the medieval empire.
Read the complete Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark is where the day begins. Next is Xanten-Fürstenberg.
The Fürstenberg is a low hill on the edge of the Lower Rhine plain, just south of Xanten, and two thousand years ago it was one of the most important military bases in the Roman Empire. Here the Romans built Vetera, a legionary fortress that housed up to two legions and served as a springboard for campaigns into Germania under Augustus. In AD 69 and 70, during the Batavian revolt, Vetera was besieged, starved into surrender and destroyed, and a new fortress was built nearby. The site on the Fürstenberg is part of the Lower German Limes, the Roman frontier along the Rhine from the Alps to the North Sea, which was added to the World Heritage list in 2021. On the ground there is little to see, mostly fields and woods, but the elevated position, with views over the river plain, explains why the Romans chose it.
Read the complete Xanten-Fürstenberg write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Xanten-Fürstenberg comes up about 63 km into the recorded legs. Next is Neuss-Koenenlager.
On the southern edge of Neuss, in a residential area near the Rhine, lies one of the most important Roman military sites in Germany, though you would hardly know it from the surface. This was Novaesium, a legionary fortress that housed thousands of soldiers for much of the first century, and it is known as the Koenenlager after Constantin Koenen, the local archaeologist who excavated it systematically in the late nineteenth century. His work revealed the layout of an entire legionary camp, with headquarters, barracks, granaries and a hospital, and it became a model for Roman military archaeology. The site is part of the Lower German Limes, listed by UNESCO in 2021.
Read the complete Neuss-Koenenlager write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 132 km into the recorded legs you reach Neuss-Koenenlager. Next is back through Xanten-Fürstenberg.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Xanten-Fürstenberg write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Xanten-Fürstenberg, late in the day. Next is Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark. That is the ride.
Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark → Xanten-Fürstenberg is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Xanten-Fürstenberg → Neuss-Koenenlager is 69 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Neuss-Koenenlager → back through Xanten-Fürstenberg is 68 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Xanten-Fürstenberg → Nijmegen-Valkhof area | Valkhofpark is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.