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.
381 km from Kamigyō-ku to Kamigyō-ku, about 6 h 47 of riding. The stops in between: Nara Palace Site, Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb, Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji and Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 800 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
45 km on Ryoan-ji → Nara Palace Site.
Fifteen stones, a rectangle of raked white gravel, and an earthen wall stained by centuries of oil: that is all of Ryoan-ji's famous garden, and it has kept visitors quiet for five hundred years. The stones sit in five groups, set in beds of moss, and the clever thing, which every guidebook mentions and which is still a pleasure to test, is that from any seat on the temple veranda at least one stone is hidden from view. Nobody knows who made it or what it means. People have read tigers crossing the sea, islands in an ocean, mountains above clouds, or simply an exercise in emptiness. The temple belongs to the Rinzai school of Zen and was founded in the middle of the fifteenth century by a powerful warlord, Hosokawa Katsumoto.
Read the complete Ryoan-ji write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ryoan-ji is where the day begins. Next is Nara Palace Site.
For most of the eighth century, Nara was the capital of Japan. The city, then called Heijō-kyō, was laid out on a grid modelled on the Chinese capital Chang'an, and at its northern end stood the imperial palace, Heijō-kyū, a vast compound of halls, offices and gardens. When the court moved away at the end of the century, the palace was abandoned and the land eventually returned to rice fields. Today the Nara Palace Site is a huge open space on the western side of the modern city, part of the UNESCO-listed Historic Monuments of Ancient Nara.
Read the complete Nara Palace Site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nara Palace Site comes up about 45 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb.
In the gentle hills of Asuka, south of Nara, the first capitals of Japan rose and fell in the sixth and seventh centuries, and the land is still dotted with the tombs of the powerful. Kengoshizuka is one of them, a mound on a low ridge that excavations revealed to be octagonal in shape, a form used for imperial tombs in that period. Inside were found twin burial chambers cut from stone, and many scholars believe it to be the tomb of Empress Saimei, who reigned twice in the seventh century, with her daughter buried beside her. Restoration work in recent years has given the mound back its original shape, faced with stones, so it is far more legible than many overgrown kofun.
Read the complete Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 79 km into the recorded legs you reach Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb. Next is Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji.
Ōminesan-ji is a temple on the summit of Mount Sanjō, one of the peaks of the Ōmine range in the heart of the Kii peninsula, and it holds a special place in Japanese religion. It is a centre of Shugendō, the mountain ascetic tradition that blends Buddhism, Shinto and older mountain worship, and its practitioners, the yamabushi, undergo arduous training on the ridges. The temple is famous for another reason too: the mountain is still closed to women by tradition, one of the last such places in Japan, which has become a subject of ongoing debate.
Read the complete Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji, about halfway. Next is Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K.
Mount Kōya is one of Japan's great sacred places, a high basin in the mountains of northern Wakayama where the monk Kūkai founded a monastic centre for Shingon Buddhism in the early ninth century. Today it is a town of over a hundred temples, many of which take in overnight guests, set among towering cedars. South of the summit plateau, deep in the forested ridges, run the old pilgrim trails that link Kōya with the Kumano shrines, part of the network inscribed by UNESCO as the Sacred Sites and Pilgrimage Routes in the Kii Mountain Range.
Read the complete Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K sits at 168 km, about halfway. Next is back through Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji comes up about 257 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 301 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb. Next is back through Nara Palace Site.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nara Palace Site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Nara Palace Site, late in the day. Next is Ryoan-ji.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ryoan-ji write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 381 km.
Ryoan-ji → Nara Palace Site is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nara Palace Site → Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb → Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji → Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K is 67 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Pilgrimage Routes - Kumano Sankeimichi - K → back through Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji is 67 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Yoshino and Ômine - Ôminesan-ji → back through Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Kengoshizuka Mounded Tomb → back through Nara Palace Site is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Nara Palace Site → Ryoan-ji is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.