Why this ride
A 130 km round trip from Gostilitsy - roughly 2 h 27 in the saddle. On the way it passes The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag, Krasnoe Selo, The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin and Volkhonskoe Highway.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag and Volkhonskoe Highway
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 130 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 2 h 27
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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.
Scenic road chapters
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag → The Palace and Park Ensem
17 km on The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag → The Palace and Park Ensem.
Chapter facts
- Length
- 17 km
Saint Petersburg Imperial Shore
For about 18 km this is Saint Petersburg Imperial Shore, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it. Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
Chapter facts
- Length
- 18 km
- Named road
- Saint Petersburg Imperial Shore
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
Gostilitsy is a village on the Izhora Upland, west of Ropsha and south of Peterhof, and it is one of those places near St Petersburg where the imperial past hides behind fences and overgrown trees. The estate here is associated with Alexei Razumovsky, the Ukrainian Cossack singer who rose to become the favourite and, by many accounts, the secret husband of Empress Elizabeth in the eighteenth century. The palace and park ensemble that grew up around the manor included a house, a church, ponds and landscaped grounds fed by springs, and it is listed among the monuments of the historic centre of St Petersburg and related groups, a UNESCO site that includes many of the palaces and estates around the city.
Read the complete The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag is where the day begins. Next is The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag.
2. The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
Ropsha is one of those places where the scenery is gentle and the history is anything but. The village sits on the low Izhora Upland southwest of St Petersburg, between Krasnoe Selo and the coast road at Lomonosov, and the palace that gives the estate its name looks down over a chain of spring-fed ponds and a slow, wooded park. It was here, in July 1762, that the freshly deposed Emperor Peter III was held after his wife Catherine seized the throne, and here that he died a few days later under circumstances nobody at court cared to explain. Catherine became "the Great"; Ropsha became a footnote with a chill on it.
Read the complete The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag comes up about 17 km into the recorded legs. Next is Krasnoe Selo.
3. Krasnoe Selo
Readers of Anna Karenina will know Krasnoye Selo, even if they have never been within a thousand kilometres of it. It was here, at the summer camp of the imperial guards, that Tolstoy set the officers' steeplechase in which Vronsky rides his mare Frou-Frou to disaster in front of the court. For more than a century, from the early nineteenth century until the revolution, the guards regiments of the Russian army gathered each summer in this area south-west of Saint Petersburg for manoeuvres, parades and horse races, and the tsar and the court came to watch. It is listed as one of the monuments associated with the historic centre of Saint Petersburg.
Read the complete Krasnoe Selo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 30 km into the recorded legs you reach Krasnoe Selo. Next is The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin.
4. The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin
On the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland, between St Petersburg and Peterhof, the old road runs past a string of palaces and estates that the Russian elite built in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to be near the sea and the court. Among them, near Strelna, stands the Trinity-Sergius Hermitage, a monastery founded in the eighteenth century as a dependency of the great Trinity Lavra of St Sergius near Moscow. It is part of the wide UNESCO listing of St Petersburg's historic centre and the monuments around it.
Read the complete The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin, about halfway. Next is Volkhonskoe Highway.
5. Volkhonskoe Highway
The Volkhonskoe Highway is not a scenic mountain road but a historic route on the southern edge of Saint Petersburg, running out from the city towards Gorelovo and the old road to Krasnoye Selo. It belongs to the network of eighteenth and nineteenth century highways that linked the capital with the imperial residences and military camps to the south and west, and it is included in the wider protected area of the historic centre of Saint Petersburg and its related monuments. What you see today is a mix of suburban growth, open fields and stretches of tree-lined road, with the ghosts of history underneath.
Read the complete Volkhonskoe Highway write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Volkhonskoe Highway sits at 69 km, about halfway. Next is back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin.
6. back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin comes up about 81 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Krasnoe Selo.
7. back through Krasnoe Selo
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Krasnoe Selo write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 100 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Krasnoe Selo. Next is back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag.
8. back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag, late in the day.
9. The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The route ends here after 130 km.
Leg by leg
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag to The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag → The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag to Krasnoe Selo
The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag → Krasnoe Selo is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Krasnoe Selo to The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin
Krasnoe Selo → The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin is 18 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin to Volkhonskoe Highway
The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin → Volkhonskoe Highway is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Volkhonskoe Highway to back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin
Volkhonskoe Highway → back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin is 16 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin to back through Krasnoe Selo
back through The Monastery Troitse-Sergieva Pustin → back through Krasnoe Selo is 19 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Krasnoe Selo to back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
back through Krasnoe Selo → back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag to The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag
back through The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag → The Palace and Park Ensemble of the Villag is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.