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.
340 km from Herrliberg to Herrliberg, about 6 h 36 of riding. The stops in between: Seematte, Kehrsiten, Egolzwil 3 and Burgäschisee Ost. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,250 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Water arrives beside the road and stays for 34 km. The line follows the shore because there is nowhere else for it to go — slow enough to look. The surface follows the shoreline, so the corners arrive where the water decided, not where an engineer did.
For about 48 km this is Emmental Panorama Road, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it. Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
Under the calm surface of Lake Zurich, just off the shore at Erlenbach, lie the remains of villages that people built here more than five thousand years ago. The site called Winkel is one of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, a UNESCO site of more than a hundred settlements, and here, as elsewhere on the lake, archaeologists diving in the shallow water have found wooden piles, pottery, tools and food remains preserved in the mud. There is nothing to see from the shore, only the water and the reeds, but it is fascinating to think that the people who farmed and fished here in the Neolithic chose the same sunny slope that, thousands of years later, would become known as the Gold Coast.
Read the complete Winkel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Winkel is where the day begins. Next is Seematte.
Lake Baldegg lies in the Seetal, the lake valley north of Lucerne, a gentle, green landscape of meadows, orchards and woods, with the lake in the middle and the hills rising on either side. Seematte, on the shore near Hitzkirch, is the site of prehistoric lakeside villages, built on piles over the water's edge thousands of years ago, and it was inscribed in the same 2011 listing that covers lakeside villages from France to Slovenia. As with most such sites, there is nothing to see above ground, but the setting is lovely, and standing on the reedy shore you can imagine the wooden houses and dugout canoes.
Read the complete Seematte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Seematte comes up about 51 km into the recorded legs. Next is Kehrsiten.
Kehrsiten is a small settlement on the southern shore of Lake Lucerne, at the foot of the Bürgenstock, a steep, forested ridge that juts out into the lake, and it feels almost cut off from the rest of Switzerland. A narrow road follows the shore from Stansstad, squeezed between the rocks and the water, and ends here; beyond, the cliffs of the Bürgenstock drop straight into the lake. For most visitors, Kehrsiten is the place where the boat from Lucerne stops and the Bürgenstock funicular begins, climbing steeply through the forest to the resort on top, which has been welcoming guests since the late nineteenth century.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 91 km into the recorded legs you reach Kehrsiten. Next is Egolzwil 3.
Archaeologists named a whole Neolithic culture after Egolzwil, a small village in the canton of Lucerne, because the settlements found in the Wauwiler Moos, a former lake turned into peat bog, revealed a way of life older than anything else known in the region at the time. Egolzwil 3, one of these sites, was a village of farmers who lived on the shore of a small lake over six thousand years ago, and it counts as one component of UNESCO's inscription of prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps. The lake was drained in the nineteenth century to create farmland, and the remains were preserved in the wet peat.
Read the complete Egolzwil 3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Egolzwil 3, about halfway. Next is Burgäschisee Ost.
Burgäschisee is a small, quiet lake on the border between the cantons of Bern and Solothurn, surrounded by reeds, woods and farmland. It would be easy to ride past without noticing, but it holds a secret: along its shores, archaeologists have found the remains of Neolithic villages built on piles, dating back more than five thousand years. The eastern shore site, Burgäschisee Ost, is one of the components of the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps World Heritage site, listed by UNESCO in 2011. There is nothing much to see on the surface, as the remains lie underwater or in the soft ground, but the peaceful setting makes it easy to imagine the wooden houses, canoes and fishing nets of those early farmers.
Read the complete Burgäschisee Ost write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Burgäschisee Ost sits at 151 km, about halfway. Next is back through Egolzwil 3.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Egolzwil 3 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Egolzwil 3 comes up about 203 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Kehrsiten.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Kehrsiten write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 250 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Kehrsiten. Next is back through Seematte.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Seematte write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Seematte, late in the day. Next is Winkel.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Winkel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 340 km.
Winkel → Seematte is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Seematte → Kehrsiten is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Kehrsiten → Egolzwil 3 is 48 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Egolzwil 3 → Burgäschisee Ost is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Burgäschisee Ost → back through Egolzwil 3 is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Egolzwil 3 → back through Kehrsiten is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Kehrsiten → back through Seematte is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Seematte → Winkel is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.