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 Naranjal it runs 441 km to Naranjal; allow about 10 h 18 of riding. It goes by way of Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha, Segment Mamamag - Mamamag, Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d and back through Segment Mamamag - Mamamag. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 3,750 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 32 km this is Avenue of the Volcanoes, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Naranjal is the opposite of the high Andes. Down on the coastal plain of southern Ecuador, the air is hot and humid, the land is green and flat, and the farms grow bananas, cacao and, increasingly, shrimp in ponds along the estuaries. Yet the same Inca road system that crosses the mountains near Cuenca came down to this coast, and the segment at Botija Paqui is a stretch of it that UNESCO lists among the Qhapaq Ñan sites. The road was both a highway and a statement, linking distant provinces to the empire's heart.
Read the complete Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui is where the day begins. Next is Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha.
If Mamamag is the top of the climb, Santa Martha is the other end of the story: the foothills where the Andes tip into the coastal plain, thirty-odd kilometres from Naranjal and a long way from anywhere that feels like highland. The air is thicker and wetter here, and the vegetation changes from tussock grass to ferns, bamboo and the dense green of the western slopes.
Read the complete Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha comes up about 80 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Mamamag - Mamamag.
West of Cuenca the Andes lift quickly, and the Mamamag label sits on the edge of that rise, about twenty-four kilometres from the city, where the cultivated valleys give way to cold, open páramo. The nearest real town is Cuenca itself, a university city of cobbled colonial streets at roughly two and a half thousand metres, and anything you need, from fuel to a decent soup, you should sort out there before you climb.
Read the complete Segment Mamamag - Mamamag write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 190 km into the recorded legs you reach Segment Mamamag - Mamamag. Next is Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d.
High in the southern Ecuadorian Andes, at about 2,500 metres, Cuenca was founded by the Spanish in 1557 on a grid plan, on the site of an Inca city called Tomebamba, which was itself built over an earlier Cañari settlement. The colonial centre, with its cobbled streets, whitewashed houses with wooden balconies, churches and plazas, was inscribed by UNESCO in 1999, and the blue-tiled domes of the new cathedral are the city's landmark. The Tomebamba river runs through the city, lined with parks and old houses perched on the bank.
Read the complete Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d, about halfway. Next is back through Segment Mamamag - Mamamag.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Mamamag - Mamamag write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Mamamag - Mamamag sits at 145 km, about halfway. Next is back through Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha comes up about 362 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui closes the day.
Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui → Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha is 80 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha → Segment Mamamag - Mamamag is 110 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Mamamag - Mamamag → Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Historic Centre of Santa Ana de los Ríos d → back through Segment Mamamag - Mamamag is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Mamamag - Mamamag → back through Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha is 103 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha → Segment Botija Paqui - Botija Paqui is 80 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.