Why this ride
An 88 km round trip from Wittenberg - roughly 1 h 54 in the saddle. The stops in between: Parks of Wörlitz, Historical Graveyard Dessau and back through Parks of Wörlitz.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The Town Church and Historical Graveyard Dessau
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 88 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 1 h 54
- 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.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. The Town Church
Wittenberg is a small town on the Elbe, in flat sandy country, and it is the place where the Reformation began. The Town Church of St Mary was the church where Martin Luther preached for decades, and where in 1525 he was married to Katharina von Bora, a former nun. The twin towers rise over the market square, and the interior holds an altarpiece painted by Lucas Cranach the Elder and his workshop, finished in the 1540s, which shows the Lord's Supper, baptism, confession and preaching, illustrating the new Protestant ideas in a way ordinary people could grasp. Luther himself and his friends appear in the paintings.
Read the complete The Town Church write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The Town Church is where the day begins. Next is Parks of Wörlitz.
2. Parks of Wörlitz
Prince Leopold III Friedrich Franz of Anhalt-Dessau, a ruler of a small German state in the late eighteenth century, came back from travels in England and Italy and decided to turn his whole principality into a garden. The result, the Garden Realm of Dessau-Wörlitz, is now a World Heritage Site, and the parks of Wörlitz are its heart: an English landscape garden laid out around a lake fed by the Elbe, with canals, bridges, temples, a synagogue built as a temple of tolerance, and the palace at Wörlitz, designed by Friedrich Wilhelm von Erdmannsdorff and regarded as one of the first neoclassical buildings in Germany.
Read the complete Parks of Wörlitz write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Parks of Wörlitz comes up about 24 km into the recorded legs. Next is Historical Graveyard Dessau.
3. Historical Graveyard Dessau
Dessau is best known for the Bauhaus, but the city's older story is one of parks and princes. The Historical Graveyard, laid out in the Enlightenment spirit of the late eighteenth century, was designed as a landscape garden as much as a burial ground, with winding paths, old trees and monuments set among greenery. Prince Leopold III Friedrich Franz of Anhalt-Dessau, who created the nearby Garden Realm of Dessau-Wörlitz, believed that gardens could educate and uplift, and the cemetery follows the same idea: a place to walk and reflect.
Read the complete Historical Graveyard Dessau write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 44 km into the recorded legs you reach Historical Graveyard Dessau. Next is back through Parks of Wörlitz.
4. back through Parks of Wörlitz
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Parks of Wörlitz write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Parks of Wörlitz, late in the day. Next is The Town Church.
5. The Town Church
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The Town Church write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Back at The Town Church. That is the ride.
Leg by leg
The Town Church to Parks of Wörlitz
The Town Church → Parks of Wörlitz is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Parks of Wörlitz to Historical Graveyard Dessau
Parks of Wörlitz → Historical Graveyard Dessau is 20 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Historical Graveyard Dessau to back through Parks of Wörlitz
Historical Graveyard Dessau → back through Parks of Wörlitz is 20 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Parks of Wörlitz to The Town Church
back through Parks of Wörlitz → The Town Church is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.