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.
A 766 km round trip from Vose’ - roughly 13 h 12 in the saddle. The stops in between: Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal, Shahrtepa, Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery and back through Shahrtepa. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Shahristoni is an old word for the inner town of a medieval city, and Hulbuk was a large one. In the ninth to eleventh centuries, when the Samanid dynasty ruled much of Central Asia from Bukhara, Hulbuk was the capital of Khuttal, a rich district in the south-east of what is now Tajikistan, and its rulers built a palace complex with courtyards, halls and fortified walls. Excavators have found fine carved alabaster panels, painted ceramics, glazed bowls and bits of mosaic, which show how sophisticated the court was, a Persian-speaking world that produced scholars, poets and astronomers. The city was destroyed in the Mongol invasion of the thirteenth century and never rebuilt.
Read the complete Shahristoni Hulbuk write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Shahristoni Hulbuk is where the day begins. Next is Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal.
Khuttal was a medieval kingdom in the south of what is now Tajikistan, centred on the fertile valleys between the Vakhsh and Panj rivers, and it flourished as a crossroads of trade and culture between Central Asia, Iran and India. The region's heritage includes the ruins of palaces, towns and religious buildings, such as the citadel of Hulbuk, near Vose', a royal residence from the ninth to the eleventh centuries, with richly decorated walls, and the town of Kulob, with the mausoleum of the fourteenth-century Sufi scholar Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani. Several of these sites have been nominated together for UNESCO recognition.
Read the complete Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal comes up about 91 km into the recorded legs. Next is Shahrtepa.
Shahrtepa lies in the lowlands of southern Tajikistan, in Khatlon province, within sight of the Panj river and the Afghan hills beyond. The word tepa means a mound, and it is the right word: a mound that has built up over centuries as one settlement was layered over another, in the Bactrian country that Alexander crossed and that later fed the Kushan empire. A Buddhist temple site is linked with this area, a reminder that this was once a place where monks, merchants and caravans met on the way between India, Central Asia and China.
Read the complete Shahrtepa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 179 km into the recorded legs you reach Shahrtepa. Next is Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery.
In the Vakhsh valley of southern Tajikistan, near the city of Bokhtar, once called Qurghonteppa, a low mound of earth in the fields hides the remains of a Buddhist monastery from the seventh and eighth centuries. Excavations at Ajina Tepa, which means the hill of the demons in local tradition, revealed a complex of courtyards, cells, corridors and stupas, built of mud brick and decorated with paintings and clay sculptures. The most spectacular find, uncovered in 1966, was a giant reclining Buddha, around thirteen metres long, depicting the Buddha entering nirvana.
Read the complete Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery, about halfway. Next is back through Shahrtepa.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Shahrtepa write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Shahrtepa sits at 510 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal comes up about 678 km into the recorded legs. Next is Shahristoni Hulbuk.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Shahristoni Hulbuk write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Shahristoni Hulbuk closes the day.
Shahristoni Hulbuk → Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal is 91 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal → Shahrtepa is 88 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Shahrtepa → Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery is 205 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Ajinatepa Buddhist monastery → back through Shahrtepa is 205 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Shahrtepa → back through Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal is 88 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cultural Heritage Sites of Ancient Khuttal → Shahristoni Hulbuk is 91 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.