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.
The stops in between: Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca, Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral and back through Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 3,200 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
The name Portal del Inca suggests a gate, and in a way it is one: a threshold on the road that the Incas drove south across the desert from the Andean heartland. Qhapaq Ñan is the name of the whole system, a network of tracks that stretched for thousands of kilometres and carried armies, tax goods and runners with messages. In the Atacama it was built simply, since the ground was hard and dry. Stones were cleared and lined up to mark the path, and the tambos, or roadside stations, stood at intervals with stores of food and water for officials.
Read the complete Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal is where the day begins. Next is Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca.
Out here the Incas walked a road through country that most of us would call empty, and they did it without wheels, horses or a single petrol station. The stretch between the Río de la Sal and the Pampa del Inca is one of the Chilean pieces of the Qhapaq Ñan, the great Andean road network that tied Cusco to the far corners of the empire and was listed by UNESCO across six countries in 2014. In the Atacama region it shows up as a faint, dead-straight trace across gravel plains, sometimes edged with stones, sometimes marked by the low ruins of a tambo where runners and caravans once rested.
Read the complete Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca comes up about 28 km into the recorded legs. Next is Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral.
The Atacama desert is the driest place on earth outside the poles, and the Inca crossed it on foot. The Qhapaq Ñan, the great Inca road system, included a southern branch that ran from Cusco down into what is now northern Chile, and this segment between Pampa del Inca and the farm of Chañaral lies in the region of Atacama, close to the town of Diego de Almagro. It is part of the UNESCO listing of the Qhapaq Ñan in 2014.
Read the complete Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 49 km into the recorded legs you reach Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral. Next is back through Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca, late in the day. Next is Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal. That is the ride.
Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal → Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca → Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral is 21 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Segment Pampa del Inca-Finca de Chañaral → back through Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Segment Río de La Sal - Pampa del Inca → Segment Portal del Inca - Río de La Sal is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.