Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine and Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria
Plan this ride
Recorded distance
208 km
Riding-time estimate
4 h 45
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.
208 km from Campiglia Cervo to Campiglia Cervo, about 4 h 45 of riding. On the way it passes Ivrea, Sacro Monte di Belmonte, Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria and back through Sacro Monte di Belmonte. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,750 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine
Oropa is a sanctuary on a scale that surprises everyone who comes up the valley from Biella for the first time. At almost twelve hundred metres, in a bowl of mountains, a vast complex of churches, courtyards, porticoes and pilgrim lodgings rises in terraces, built over several centuries around an ancient chapel that holds a Black Madonna, a wooden statue of the Virgin that legend attributes to St Luke. Above the main buildings, a Sacro Monte of chapels with life-size statues illustrates the life of Mary along a wooded path. It is one of the nine Sacri Monti of Piedmont and Lombardy listed by UNESCO in 2003, and one of the most important Marian shrines in the Alps.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine is where the day begins. Next is Ivrea.
2. Ivrea
Ivrea is the town Olivetti built, or at least rebuilt. In the twentieth century the Olivetti company, famous for typewriters, calculators and some of the first personal computers, turned this small Piedmontese town into a showcase of what industry could be: factories with glass walls and natural light, worker housing, libraries, nurseries and social services designed by the best architects of the day. Adriano Olivetti believed a company should serve its community, and the result was listed by UNESCO in 2018 as an industrial city of the twentieth century. Walk along Corso Jervis and you can see the buildings still standing, some reused, some waiting.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Ivrea comes up about 37 km into the recorded legs. Next is Sacro Monte di Belmonte.
3. Sacro Monte di Belmonte
On a granite hill rising above the Canavese plain north of Turin, the Sacro Monte di Belmonte looks out over the foothills toward the Alps. The sanctuary, run by Franciscan friars, has a church and a circuit of chapels representing the stations of the Passion, built in the early eighteenth century on a site that had long been a place of pilgrimage. It is part of the UNESCO-listed Sacri Monti of Piedmont and Lombardy, and the walk around the chapels, under chestnut and oak trees, is calm and shady even in summer.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 66 km into the recorded legs you reach Sacro Monte di Belmonte. Next is Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria.
4. Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria
The Parco La Mandria, north-west of Turin, is the largest remnant of the royal hunting estates of the House of Savoy, and the Borgo Castello at its centre was once the heart of the estate. The word mandria means a herd, and the park began as a stud and breeding farm for horses and cattle on the plain, with the woods kept for the hunt. Today the park is a protected area of about three thousand hectares, surrounded by a wall, where visitors walk or cycle between oaks, hornbeams and meadows, and where deer and wild boar still live.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine closes the day.
Leg by leg
Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine to Ivrea
Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine → Ivrea is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ivrea to Sacro Monte di Belmonte
Ivrea → Sacro Monte di Belmonte is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sacro Monte di Belmonte to Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria
Sacro Monte di Belmonte → Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria to back through Sacro Monte di Belmonte
Borgo castello nel parco della Mandria → back through Sacro Monte di Belmonte is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Sacro Monte di Belmonte to back through Ivrea
back through Sacro Monte di Belmonte → back through Ivrea is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ivrea to Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine
back through Ivrea → Sacro Monte della Beata Vergine is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.