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 Rillo de Gallo it runs 408 km to Rillo de Gallo; allow about 6 h 15 of riding. It goes by way of Cañada de marco, Iglesia de Santa María, Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí and back through Iglesia de Santa María. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,300 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
73 km on Iglesia de Santa María → Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí.
The Señorío de Molina is a high, cold, sparsely populated tableland on the boundary of Guadalajara and Aragon, and it feels like it, with big skies, wheat and sheep, wide valleys and villages of stone. Rillo, five or six kilometres from Molina de Aragón, sits at about a thousand metres on this plateau, where winters are among the harshest in Spain and snow can lie for weeks. Molina has a reputation as one of the coldest towns in the country, but a rider in June finds only a dry, bright warmth.
Read the complete Rillo I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rillo I is where the day begins. Next is Cañada de marco.
Calamocha has a reputation in Spain, and it is not for its nightlife. This town in the Jiloca valley of Teruel province is one of the coldest places in the country in winter, a high, open basin where the air pools at night and frost bites hard. In summer that same altitude makes it pleasant when the coast is sweltering. The Cañada de Marco is a site in the hills just outside town, and the name hints at the old drove roads, the cañadas, that once carried flocks of sheep across Aragon between summer and winter pastures.
Read the complete Cañada de marco write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cañada de marco comes up about 76 km into the recorded legs. Next is Iglesia de Santa María.
Somewhere in the folds of the Sierra de Algairén, south-west of Zaragoza, a bell tower pokes up above a cluster of ochre roofs, and that is your Iglesia de Santa María. Half the villages of Aragon have a church of that name, and this one does the job the others do: it marks the middle of a small place where the shop, the bar and the plaza all orbit the same square of stone. The nearest neighbours on the map are Cosuenda, Almonacid de la Sierra and Alpartir, each a few hundred souls, each about nine kilometres off.
Read the complete Iglesia de Santa María write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 133 km into the recorded legs you reach Iglesia de Santa María. Next is Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí.
The Aljafería is the one great building in Zaragoza that tells you the city was once Muslim. It was built in the eleventh century as a pleasure palace for the Hudid rulers of the taifa of Zaragoza, a small independent kingdom that emerged when the caliphate of Córdoba collapsed, and its inner courtyard, with slender arches that interlace and curve, is one of the finest examples of Islamic architecture in the north of Spain. After the Christian conquest in 1118, it became a royal residence of the kings of Aragón, and the Catholic Monarchs added a sumptuous palace with gilded ceilings in the late fifteenth century. In the nineteenth century, it served as a barracks, and today it is the seat of the Aragonese parliament. The Mudéjar parts, the work of Muslim craftsmen who stayed after the conquest, are part of a UNESCO listing for Mudéjar architecture in Aragón.
Read the complete Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí, about halfway. Next is back through Iglesia de Santa María.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Iglesia de Santa María write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Iglesia de Santa María sits at 272 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cañada de marco.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cañada de marco write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cañada de marco comes up about 333 km into the recorded legs. Next is Rillo I.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Rillo I write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Rillo I closes the day.
Rillo I → Cañada de marco is 76 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Cañada de marco → Iglesia de Santa María is 57 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Iglesia de Santa María → Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí is 73 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Restos mudéjares de palacio de la Aljaferí → back through Iglesia de Santa María is 72 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Iglesia de Santa María → back through Cañada de marco is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cañada de marco → Rillo I is 76 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.