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 Steckborn it runs 441 km to Steckborn; allow about 6 h 19 of riding. It goes by way of Robenhausen, Egelsee, Storen-Wildsberg and Oterswil / Insel Eielen. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,150 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It crosses from Germany into Switzerland - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
The ride follows Robenhausen → Egelsee for 48 km.
For about 59 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it. Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
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.
Read the complete Wangen-Hinterhorn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Wangen-Hinterhorn is where the day begins. Next is Robenhausen.
In 1858 a local man named Jakob Messikommer began digging in the peat bog at Robenhausen, on the southern end of the Pfäffikersee in the Zurich Oberland, and he spent decades uncovering a remarkably rich Neolithic pile-dwelling settlement. His finds, from stone axes to woven textiles and charred bread, travelled to museums around the world and helped make Swiss lake dwellings famous. Today Robenhausen is one of the components of the UNESCO Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, though what remains lies underground in a protected wetland.
Read the complete Robenhausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Robenhausen comes up about 69 km into the recorded legs. Next is Egelsee.
There is almost nothing to see at the Egelsee, and that is part of its charm. It is a small, reed-fringed bog lake in the rolling Thurgau countryside between Gachnang and Frauenfeld, and under its peat and mud lie the remains of a Neolithic lakeside settlement, timber piles and floor layers preserved for thousands of years because air never reached them. It is one of the many sites that make up the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps on the UNESCO list, and unlike the reconstructed villages you find elsewhere, this one has been left in the ground on purpose. Archaeologists consider the soggy earth the best museum there is.
Read the complete Egelsee write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 117 km into the recorded legs you reach Egelsee. Next is 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.
Read the complete Storen-Wildsberg write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Storen-Wildsberg, about halfway. Next is Oterswil / Insel Eielen.
Lake Zug is the quiet one among the central Swiss lakes, long and slender, with the Rigi rising steeply from its southern end and gentle farmland and orchards rolling down to its northern shores. Around its edges, as around many Alpine lakes, people built villages on the shore in prehistoric times, and the remains of these settlements at places like Oterswil and the little island of Eielen are among the sites of the transnational pile dwelling listing inscribed by UNESCO in 2011. Under water and mud, wooden piles, pottery and tools have survived for thousands of years.
Read the complete Oterswil / Insel Eielen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Oterswil / Insel Eielen sits at 161 km, about halfway. Next is back through Storen-Wildsberg.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Storen-Wildsberg write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Storen-Wildsberg comes up about 283 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Egelsee.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Egelsee write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 324 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Egelsee. Next is back through Robenhausen.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Robenhausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Robenhausen, late in the day. Next is Wangen-Hinterhorn.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Wangen-Hinterhorn write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 441 km.
Wangen-Hinterhorn → Robenhausen is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Robenhausen → Egelsee is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Egelsee → Storen-Wildsberg is 44 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Storen-Wildsberg → Oterswil / Insel Eielen is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Oterswil / Insel Eielen → back through Storen-Wildsberg is 63 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Storen-Wildsberg → back through Egelsee is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Egelsee → back through Robenhausen is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Robenhausen → Wangen-Hinterhorn is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.