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.
361 km from Adelsheim to Adelsheim, about 6 h 29 of riding. On the way it passes Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68, Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par, Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 and Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 41 km this is Romantic Road, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Somewhere between Walldürn and the hills north of Stuttgart, the Roman surveyors drew a line on the map and simply refused to bend it. For about eighty kilometres, the Upper Germanic Limes runs almost perfectly straight across hill and valley, one of the most remarkable feats of ancient surveying in Europe. The watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 near Osterburken and Adelsheim lie on that straight stretch, and like the rest of the frontier they are part of the UNESCO Frontiers of the Roman Empire. Most are now low mounds in fields and woods, but here and there you will find a reconstructed tower or a stretch of wall to give you an idea of what it looked like.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 is where the day begins. Next is Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68.
Between Öhringen and Mainhardt, the Upper German Limes does something a Roman engineer must have been proud of: it runs dead straight for many kilometres, up hill and down dale, ignoring the terrain as if drawn with a ruler on a map. The watchtower sites numbered along this section lie on that line, in the Hohenlohe country of northern Württemberg, between the open farmland around Pfedelbach and the dark wooded hills of the Swabian-Franconian Forest.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 comes up about 53 km into the recorded legs. Next is Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par.
In the Swabian Forest east of Stuttgart, the Roman frontier ran as straight as a ruler for some eighty kilometres, ignoring hills and valleys in a way that still puzzles historians. Welzheim lies on this straight stretch of the Upper German-Raetian Limes, and the town had two Roman forts, the west and east forts, with a civil settlement around them. The northern part of the settlement near the east fort is one of the components of the Limes World Heritage Site, and the Ostkastell has been turned into an archaeological park with a reconstructed gate.
Read the complete Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 98 km into the recorded legs you reach Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par. Next is Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68.
The Roman frontier wall known as the Limes ran for more than five hundred kilometres across what is now southern Germany, from the Rhine to the Danube, and near Aalen it passed through the Kocher valley and over the hills of the Ostalb. Along its length, watchtowers were built at regular intervals, numbered by archaeologists in sequence: WP 12/60 to 12/68 are a group of tower sites near Hüttlingen, mostly now visible as low mounds or reconstructed foundations. The Upper Germanic-Raetian Limes was inscribed by UNESCO in 2005 as part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68, about halfway. Next is Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12.
Along the Wörnitz valley in western Middle Franconia, near the village of Weiltingen, the line of the Raetian Limes cuts across the countryside, and the places where Roman watchtowers once stood are numbered by archaeologists in a dry sequence: WP 13/6, 13/7, and so on. In Raetia, the frontier was not a palisade, as in Upper Germany, but a stone wall about three metres high, and local people called its remains the Teufelsmauer, the Devil's Wall, believing that only the devil could have built something so long and straight. Today, you may see a low bank in a field or a line of trees following the old route, and in some places the foundations of towers have been marked or reconstructed.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12 sits at 167 km, about halfway. Next is back through Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 comes up about 221 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 261 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par. Next is back through Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68, late in the day. Next is Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 361 km.
Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 → Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 → Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par is 45 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par → Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 → Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12 is 41 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchtowers WP 13/6 to 13/12 → back through Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 is 42 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtowers WP 12/60 to 12/68 → back through Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Welzheim-Ost civil settlement northern par → back through Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 is 46 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchtowers WP 9/36 to 9/68 → Watchtowers WP 8/31 to 8/41 is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.