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 Holzhausen an der Haide it runs 168 km to Holzhausen an der Haide; allow about 3 h 09 of riding. The stops in between: Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort, Watchtower WP 1/77, Watchtower WP 1/51 and Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 17 km this is Rhine Romantic Route, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Kastell Holzhausen is one of the best-preserved Roman forts along the German Limes, and it lies in a forest clearing near the village of Holzhausen an der Haide in the western Taunus, where the remains of its stone walls, gates and corner towers still stand to a height of a metre or more. The fort housed an auxiliary cohort of several hundred soldiers in the second and third centuries, and it guarded a section of the frontier, the Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes, along with a chain of watchtowers spaced at regular intervals along the line. The watchtowers numbered WP 2/26 to 2/30, part of the UNESCO listing, stood on this section between the fort and its neighbours.
Read the complete Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30 is where the day begins. Next is Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort.
Between the Lahn and the Rhine, the Roman frontier crossed a high, wooded plateau known locally as the Einrich, and the watchtowers from 2/7 to 2/13 stood on this stretch, near the village of Dachsenhausen. In the forest, the earth bank and ditch can still be followed, and small forts, built to house the soldiers who manned the towers, have left their outlines in the ground. Here, as elsewhere in Germany, the Limes belongs to the frontiers of the Roman Empire on the World Heritage list, but the forest is quiet, and you may walk the line for an hour without meeting anyone.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort comes up about 17 km into the recorded legs. Next is Watchtower WP 1/77.
In the hills of the Westerwald, east of Koblenz, the Roman frontier ran from the Rhine up across the high ground towards the Taunus, and archaeologists have numbered every tower site along it. Watchtower WP 1/77, near the villages of Kadenbach and Arzbach, is one of them, now marked by a low mound or reconstructed foundations in the woods. The frontier here was a palisade of timber and later an earth bank and ditch, with towers every few hundred metres, and the whole system is part of the Upper German-Raetian Limes World Heritage listing.
Read the complete Watchtower WP 1/77 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 39 km into the recorded legs you reach Watchtower WP 1/77. Next is Watchtower WP 1/51.
The Upper Germanic Limes does not start with a bang. Near Bendorf, on the slopes where the Westerwald drops toward the Rhine at the Neuwied basin, it is a matter of reading the woods: a low bank here, a shallow ditch there, and the spot where a Roman watchtower once stood, numbered by archaeologists as WP 1/51. The towers were placed within sight of each other, timber at first and later stone, so that a signal could pass along the frontier faster than any rider. Standing here among the beech trees you are close to the northern end of a border that ran more than five hundred kilometres to the Danube.
Read the complete Watchtower WP 1/51 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtower WP 1/51, about halfway. Next is Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81.
Kadenbach, Arzbach and Eitelborn are three small villages on the broad, wooded plateau of the Westerwald, a short way north of the Lahn valley, and the four watchtowers here sit in a short run along the Roman frontier. Numbers 1/78 to 1/81 belong to the first section of the Upper German-Raetian Limes, running from the Rhine towards the Taunus. The frontier was a palisade with towers placed within sight of one another, and the signal system relied on fire at night and smoke or flag by day. In this area the Romans picked ridges and shoulders of hills so the view ran for miles over land that was then forest and scrub.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81 sits at 67 km, about halfway. Next is back through Watchtower WP 1/51.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtower WP 1/51 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchtower WP 1/51 comes up about 108 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Watchtower WP 1/77.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtower WP 1/77 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 128 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Watchtower WP 1/77. Next is back through Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort, late in the day. Next is Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 168 km.
Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30 → Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort → Watchtower WP 1/77 is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtower WP 1/77 → Watchtower WP 1/51 is 21 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtower WP 1/51 → Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81 is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 1/78 to 1/81 → back through Watchtower WP 1/51 is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtower WP 1/51 → back through Watchtower WP 1/77 is 20 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtower WP 1/77 → back through Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtowers WP 2/7 and 2/13 including fort → Watchtoers WP 2/26 to 2/30 is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.