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.
494 km from Quatro Barras to Quatro Barras, about 9 h 10 of riding. It goes by way of Guaraguacu Ecological Station, Salto Morato Private Reserve and back through Guaraguacu Ecological Station. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 109 km this is Estrada da Graciosa, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
South of Curitiba the Serra do Mar stops being a distant wall and becomes a country of its own, folded into sharp green peaks that rise from the coastal plain of Paraná to well over a thousand metres. The Serras do Cordeiro belong to that mountain tangle, in the zone of protected land and state parks around Pau Oco, near the town of Quatro Barras. Pico Paraná, the highest summit in southern Brazil, and the pyramid of Marumbi are the big names nearby, and the whole range is blanketed by Atlantic forest, a wet, mossy, orchid-hung woodland that catches the clouds coming off the ocean and drips for most of the year.
Read the complete Serras do Cordeiro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Serras do Cordeiro is where the day begins. Next is Guaraguacu Ecological Station.
On the coast of Paraná, between the port city of Paranaguá and the beaches of Pontal do Paraná, the Guaraguaçu Ecological Station protects a stretch of lowland forest, mangrove and sandy restinga along the Guaraguaçu river. It belongs to the network of Atlantic Forest reserves that UNESCO lists for the south and southeast of Brazil, here around the Paranaguá bay, one of the best preserved estuaries on the Brazilian coast. Access to the station itself is restricted, as ecological stations are mainly for research, but the surrounding landscape gives a strong sense of what it protects.
Read the complete Guaraguacu Ecological Station write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Guaraguaçu Ecological Station comes up about 109 km into the recorded legs. Next is Salto Morato Private Reserve.
On the Paraná coast of Brazil the Atlantic Forest comes down almost to the sea, and Salto Morato is a private reserve that protects a good piece of it. A few thousand hectares of dense, wet forest, ferns, palms, orchids and giant trees covered in moss, with a trail that leads to a waterfall of about a hundred metres plunging down a green cliff. The Atlantic Forest was once enormous, running along most of the Brazilian coast, but today only a small fraction survives, and this area, with its neighbours in the Serra do Mar, is one of the best-preserved parts, recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage cluster.
Read the complete Salto Morato Private Reserve write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 248 km into the recorded legs you reach Salto Morato Private Reserve. Next is back through Guaraguacu Ecological Station.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Guaraguacu Ecological Station write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Guaraguacu Ecological Station, late in the day. Next is Serras do Cordeiro.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Serras do Cordeiro write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Serras do Cordeiro. That is the ride.
Serras do Cordeiro → Guaraguacu Ecological Station is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Guaraguaçu Ecological Station → Salto Morato Private Reserve is 139 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Salto Morato Private Reserve → back through Guaraguacu Ecological Station is 137 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Guaraguacu Ecological Station → Serras do Cordeiro is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.