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.
From Kronstadt it runs 252 km to Kronstadt; allow about 4 h 23 of riding. The stops in between: P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha, Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin, The Blocade Ring and back through Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 46 km this is Saint Petersburg Imperial Shore, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Izhora is an old name for this part of the coast. Long before Saint Petersburg, the land between the Neva and the Luga belonged to the Izhorians, a small Finnic people who fished, farmed and served as pilots on the river, and whose language survives only in a few villages. Bolshaya Izhora, the Great Izhora, is a modest settlement on the shore, with a church, some dachas and a sea wall, and the nearest town of any size is Kronstadt across the water. The point on the map sits at the edge of the gulf, in reed and low scrub, where the shallows run out for hundreds of metres and the horizon is a thin line of cranes and chimneys.
Read the complete The Barrier of Pile write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The Barrier of Pile is where the day begins. Next is P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha, 35 km on.
Strelna lies at the beginning of the road to Peterhof, on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland, and its main feature is the Konstantinovsky Palace, begun in the reign of Peter the Great and named for a later grand duke, Konstantin. Like Peterhof, it was heavily damaged in the Second World War and later rebuilt, and in the early 2000s it was restored for the three-hundredth anniversary of Saint Petersburg. The park, with its canals and ponds, runs down toward the water, and the view across the gulf is wide and grey.
Read the complete P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha comes up about 46 km into the recorded legs. Next is Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin.
The history of the Pushkin district begins with a Swedish manor and a Russian victory, and the story of what grew there is the story of the Russian court itself. The town was long called Tsarskoye Selo, the Tsar's Village, and the great Catherine Palace, with its long blue and white facade and gilded decoration, was the summer residence of the empresses. Inside, the Amber Room, once panelled with amber, was looted during the Second World War and has been recreated in recent decades, to the delight of visitors.
Read the complete Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 75 km into the recorded legs you reach Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin. Next is The Blocade Ring.
The Blockade Ring stands on the south bank of the Neva, east of Saint Petersburg, close to where the Road of Life began its journey toward Lake Ladoga. It commemorates the siege of Leningrad, which lasted from September 1941 to January 1944, roughly 872 days, and the corridor that kept the city alive. When Shlisselburg fell in September 1941, the city was cut off by land, and the only lifeline ran across Ladoga, by boat in summer and over the ice in winter.
Read the complete The Blocade Ring write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The Blocade Ring, about halfway. Next is back through Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin sits at 141 km, about halfway. Next is back through P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha, 36 km on.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha comes up about 216 km into the recorded legs. Next is The Barrier of Pile.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Barrier of Pile write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The Barrier of Pile closes the day.
The Barrier of Pile → P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha → Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin → The Blocade Ring is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Blocade Ring → back through Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin is 57 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Historical Centre of the Town of Pushkin → back through P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through P.K.Alexandrov's Datcha → The Barrier of Pile is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.