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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
526 km from Naranjal to Naranjal, about 9 h 03 of riding. On the way it passes Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha, Segment Paredones - Paredones, Segment San Antonio - San Antonio and back through Segment Paredones - Paredones. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 3,350 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
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 111 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Paredones - Paredones.
West of Cuenca the Andes fall away towards the Pacific in one of the most dramatic descents on the continent, from the cold lakes and páramo of the Cajas massif to the hot banana plantations of the coastal plain. Paredones, a small Inca site in the Molleturo area on this western flank, takes its name from the stone walls, paredones, that survive among the grass: remains of buildings, enclosures and a stretch of the Qhapaq Ñan that crossed these mountains between the highlands and the coast. It is part of the Andean road system inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2014.
Read the complete Segment Paredones - Paredones write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 189 km into the recorded legs you reach Segment Paredones - Paredones. Next is Segment San Antonio - San Antonio.
What I can say is that the point lies on the steep western slope of the Andes, in the country between the highlands near Cuenca and the coastal plain, with Naranjal the nearest real town, thirty-odd kilometres off on the lowlands.
Read the complete Segment San Antonio - San Antonio write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment San Antonio - San Antonio, about halfway. Next is back through Segment Paredones - Paredones.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Paredones - Paredones write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Paredones - Paredones sits at 352 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 415 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 111 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha → Segment Paredones - Paredones is 77 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Paredones - Paredones → Segment San Antonio - San Antonio is 74 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment San Antonio - San Antonio → back through Segment Paredones - Paredones is 74 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Paredones - Paredones → back through Segment Santa Martha - Santa Martha is 77 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 111 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.