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 Gunzenhausen it runs 240 km to Gunzenhausen; allow about 4 h 22 of riding. It goes by way of Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85, Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a and back through Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85. The line favours views over speed.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 61 km this is Romantic Road, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
The numbers here, 13/46 to 13/49, belong to a surveyor's grid, but the line they follow is the old Raetian frontier, which the Romans built across Bavaria in the second century. East of the town of Gunzenhausen it was turned from a simple timber palisade into a proper stone wall, a rarity in the Roman north. The locals later called this wall the Teufelsmauer, the Devil's Wall, because they could not imagine human hands had built something so straight and so long. Folk stories said that the devil had built it overnight, and that he had run out of time just before dawn.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49 is where the day begins. Next is Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85.
In the forests near Ellwangen the Roman frontier changes character. Here the Upper Germanic Limes, with its timber palisade and ditch, meets the Raetian Limes, which the Romans eventually built as a stone wall, and the stretch of watchtowers numbered 12/69 to 12/85 runs through the farmland and woods east of the Jagst. Archaeologists number the towers with slashes and digits, which makes them sound like spare parts, but each one was a small stone or timber post with a few soldiers watching the border, passing signals along the line. Together they form part of the UNESCO Frontiers of the Roman Empire.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 comes up about 61 km into the recorded legs. Next is Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a.
Mainhardt is a small town in the Swabian-Franconian Forest, a long ridge of wooded hills east of Stuttgart and north of Schwäbisch Hall, and the Romans chose to drop their frontier straight through here. The Upper Germanic Limes runs dead straight for many kilometres in this region, up and down hills without regard to the terrain, because the surveyors drew the line first and let the army follow it. At Mainhardt there was a fort with a garrison of auxiliary soldiers, and the outline can be traced in the ground east of the town. The numbers on the label refer to the watchtowers, small timber and then stone posts that stood at intervals along the line within sight of one another.
Read the complete Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 120 km into the recorded legs you reach Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a. Next is back through Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85, late in the day. Next is Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49. That is the ride.
Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49 → Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 → Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Limessection between watchtowers WP 9/68 a → back through Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 is 58 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtowers WP 12/69 to 12/85 → Watchtowers WP 13/46 to 13/49 is 62 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.