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 Cheremule it runs 487 km to Cheremule; allow about 8 h 00 of riding. On the way it passes Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante, Necropolis of Istevéne and back through Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante. The line favours views over speed.
The Logudoro in northern Sardinia is a high, rolling country of basalt plateaus and the worn cones of extinct volcanoes, where cork oaks and wild olives stand in dry pasture and every second hill seems to have a ruined nuraghe on it. Petroglyph Park-b lies near the small villages of Cheremule, Giave and Torralba, in an area where the rock itself was used as an archive, carved into tombs and marked with symbols by people who lived here thousands of years before Rome.
Read the complete Petroglyph Park-b write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Petroglyph Park-b is where the day begins. Next is Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante.
On the side of the main road below Castelsardo, in northern Sardinia, a huge reddish rock stands alone at a bend, and it really does look like an elephant, trunk lowered, as if about to drink. It is a block of volcanic trachyte that broke away from the hills above and was sculpted by wind and rain into its strange shape. What most passing drivers miss is that its base was used long before anyone thought of elephants: two prehistoric tombs, domus de janas, were cut into the rock in the Neolithic period, and in one of them carved horn shapes, the symbol of the bull, can still be made out.
Read the complete Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante comes up about 84 km into the recorded legs. Next is Necropolis of Istevéne.
In Sardinian folklore, the little rock-cut tombs scattered across the island were the homes of janas, tiny fairies or witches who wove on golden looms and came out at night. Archaeologists call them domus de janas, fairy houses, and date them to the Neolithic and Copper Age, thousands of years before the famous nuraghi towers. The necropolis of Istevéne, near Mamoiada in the heart of the Barbagia, is a group of these chambers cut into the granite, some with carved details imitating the beams and doorways of real houses, and it belongs among the prehistoric Sardinian tombs that have gained UNESCO recognition.
Read the complete Necropolis of Istevéne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 248 km into the recorded legs you reach Necropolis of Istevéne. Next is back through Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante, late in the day. Next is Petroglyph Park-b.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Petroglyph Park-b write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Petroglyph Park-b. That is the ride.
Petroglyph Park-b → Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante → Necropolis of Istevéne is 164 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Necropolis of Istevéne → back through Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante is 154 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Domus de janas of Roccia dell’Elefante → Petroglyph Park-b is 85 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.