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 Sipplingen it runs 240 km to Sipplingen; allow about 4 h 22 of riding. The stops in between: Wangen-Hinterhorn, Weier I - III, Storen-Wildsberg and back through Weier I - III. It crosses from Germany into Switzerland - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Scenic road chapters
Grand Tour of Switzerland
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 34 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Chapter facts
Length
34 km
Named road
Grand Tour of Switzerland
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Sipplingen-Osthafen
At Sipplingen the north shore of Lake Constance changes character. The Überlinger See, the long north-western arm of the lake, is hemmed in here by steep molasse cliffs and wooded slopes rising to the Sipplinger Berg, and the village sits on a narrow strip between the hill and the water. Below the surface off the eastern harbour lie the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, villages of wooden houses built on stilts along the shore some five to six thousand years ago. They are part of the World Heritage site of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Sipplingen-Osthafen is where the day begins. Next is Wangen-Hinterhorn.
2. Wangen-Hinterhorn
When the water of the Untersee, the western arm of Lake Constance, was unusually low in the winter of 1853 to 1854, people around the Swiss and German shores noticed wooden posts sticking out of the mud. They were the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, villages built on the lakeshore thousands of years ago, and the find sparked a wave of research and a craze for lake-dwelling romance across Europe. Wangen, on the German shore of the Untersee, was one of the first sites studied, and Wangen-Hinterhorn belongs to the World Heritage inscription for prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, though there is nothing to see above the water.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Wangen-Hinterhorn comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Weier I - III.
3. Weier I - III
Just outside Thayngen, almost on the German border, a small wetland hides the remains of Neolithic villages that stood here more than five thousand years ago. The sites known as Weier I to III were built on the edge of a former lake or moor, now mostly filled in, and excavations revealed well-preserved timber houses, tools, pottery and food remains that give a detailed picture of early farming communities. They form part of the UNESCO listing of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, though as with most such sites, there is little to see above ground today beyond the landscape itself.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 57 km into the recorded legs you reach Weier I - III. Next is Storen-Wildsberg.
4. Storen-Wildsberg
The Greifensee lies just east of Zurich, a shallow, quiet lake of about six kilometres in length, framed by reeds, meadows and the gentle hills of the Zurich Oberland. Its shores are largely protected, and there is no road running right along the water, which keeps it remarkably calm for a lake so close to Switzerland's biggest city. At Storen-Wildsberg near the village of Greifensee, the remains of a prehistoric settlement lie under the water and in the shoreline sediments, one of the Swiss sites in the UNESCO listing of Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps. As with all of them, it is the ground itself that is protected; there is nothing to see except the reeds and the water.