Oberranna - Kleinkastell and Künzing - Amphitheater und Vicus
Plan this ride
Recorded distance
126 km
Riding-time estimate
1 h 58
Journey
Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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 126 km round trip from Sankt Aegidi - roughly 1 h 58 in the saddle. It goes by way of Passau Haibach - Burgus, Künzing - Amphitheater und Vicus and back through Passau Haibach - Burgus. It crosses from Austria into Germany - 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. 32 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Chapter facts
Length
28 km
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Oberranna - Kleinkastell
The Danube between Passau and Linz is one of the loveliest stretches of the whole river, and near Oberranna, on the Upper Austrian bank, it flows quietly between steep wooded slopes, dark and almost gorge-like. Here, beside the water, archaeologists found a small Roman fort, a Kleinkastell, part of the Danube Limes that guarded the northern frontier of the province of Noricum. Its remains are now protected under a modern shelter, and it forms part of the UNESCO listing of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire along the Danube.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Oberranna - Kleinkastell is where the day begins. Next is Passau Haibach - Burgus.
2. Passau Haibach - Burgus
Passau sits where three rivers meet, the Danube, the Inn and the Ilz, and from the high point of the Oberhaus fortress you can see their colours run side by side before mixing: green from the Inn, blue-grey from the Danube, and dark from the Ilz, which flows down from the Bavarian Forest stained by peat. The Romans knew this spot well. They had a fort here called Batavis, named after a unit of Batavian soldiers from the Rhine delta, and another at Boiotro across the Inn, and along the Danube downstream they built small fortified towers called burgi to watch the river and signal to each other. One of these late Roman burgi stood near Haibach, and its remains are part of the Danube Limes, inscribed by UNESCO in 2021 as part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Passau Haibach - Burgus comes up about 28 km into the recorded legs. Next is Künzing - Amphitheater und Vicus.
3. Künzing - Amphitheater und Vicus
Künzing sits on the Danube in Lower Bavaria, in a broad, fertile plain known as the Gäuboden, and in Roman times it was a place with a name, Quintana. The Romans built a fort here in the second century, one of the posts on the river frontier of the province of Raetia, and a civilian settlement, a vicus, grew up beside it, with houses, workshops and even an amphitheatre. The Danube Limes in Germany, Austria and Slovakia was listed by UNESCO in 2021, and Künzing is one of the places where it is easiest to grasp what daily life along the frontier was like.