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 Bern it runs 332 km to Bern; allow about 5 h 12 of riding. On the way it passes Rütte, Pointe de Montbec I, Corcelettes Les Violes and Les Roseaux. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,000 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 40 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Bern does not shout. The Swiss capital sits on a sandstone spur in a tight loop of the green Aare, with six kilometres of arcaded streets that let you walk the whole old town in the rain without getting wet. It was founded in 1191 by Duke Berthold V of Zähringen, and legend says he named it after the first animal he killed hunting nearby, a bear. The bears have been the town's mascots ever since, and a few still live in the BärenPark down by the river at the end of the Nydeggbrücke.
Read the complete Old City of Berne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Old City of Berne is where the day begins. Next is Rütte.
Rütte sits on the gentle southern slope above Lake Biel, a scatter of farms and orchards between the village of Bellmund and the lakeshore, with the long blue ridge of the Jura filling the view across the water. Nidau and the city of Biel are a few minutes away, yet up here it feels thoroughly rural: cows, cherry trees, a sharp smell of cut grass in early summer and the clank of a tractor somewhere below.
Read the complete Rütte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rütte comes up about 40 km into the recorded legs. Next is Pointe de Montbec I.
The south shore of Lake Neuchâtel is a long, soft margin of reeds, shallow water and woodland, and it hides one of the richest archaeological records in Europe. Pointe de Montbec, near the villages along the Fribourg and Vaud shore opposite Neuchâtel, is one of the places where prehistoric lake dwellers built their villages on the water's edge thousands of years ago. Their houses stood on piles driven into the soft lake shore, and when lake levels rose, the remains were sealed under water and mud, preserving wood, textiles, seeds and tools in astonishing detail. The prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps were inscribed by UNESCO in 2011 as a single serial site spanning six countries, and this shore contributes a good number of them.
Read the complete Pointe de Montbec I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 70 km into the recorded legs you reach Pointe de Montbec I. Next is Corcelettes Les Violes.
Corcelettes is a little lakeside hamlet just north of Grandson, near the southern tip of Lake Neuchâtel, and Les Violes is the stretch of shallow shore where Bronze Age people built a village of wooden houses on piles, some three thousand years ago. The site was one of the first in the region to attract attention in the nineteenth century, when low water levels after the correction of the Jura waters exposed forests of ancient posts in the mud. It is now listed among the prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps.
Read the complete Corcelettes Les Violes write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Corcelettes Les Violes, about halfway. Next is Les Roseaux.
Morges sits on the north shore of Lake Geneva between Lausanne and Geneva, with its castle by the harbour and the Alps of Savoy rising across the water. Just east of the town, at a place called Les Roseaux, the reeds, archaeologists found one of the oldest pile dwelling sites on the lake, dating back to the early Bronze Age, and it is part of the UNESCO group of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps. Its remains lie underwater and are not visible, but the name and the shore keep the memory.
Read the complete Les Roseaux write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Les Roseaux sits at 153 km, about halfway. Next is back through Corcelettes Les Violes.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Corcelettes Les Violes write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Corcelettes Les Violes comes up about 210 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Pointe de Montbec I.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Pointe de Montbec I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 264 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Pointe de Montbec I. Next is back through Rütte.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rütte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Rütte, late in the day. Next is Old City of Berne.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Old City of Berne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 332 km.
Old City of Berne → Rütte is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Rütte → Pointe de Montbec I is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Pointe de Montbec I → Corcelettes Les Violes is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Corcelettes Les Violes → Les Roseaux is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Les Roseaux → back through Corcelettes Les Violes is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Corcelettes Les Violes → back through Pointe de Montbec I is 54 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Pointe de Montbec I → back through Rütte is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Rütte → Old City of Berne is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.