CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. 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 Gelsenkirchen it runs 182 km to Gelsenkirchen; allow about 2 h 46 of riding. It goes by way of Duisburg-Werthausen, Alpen-Drüpt, Kalkar-Bornsches Feld and back through Alpen-Drüpt. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 33 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
The headframe of Shaft XII at Zollverein, with its red steel lattice and double wheels, is the Eiffel Tower of the Ruhr, and it is easy to see why. Designed by the architects Fritz Schupp and Martin Kremmer and opened in 1932, the shaft and its surrounding buildings were built in a clean, functional style influenced by the Bauhaus, and it was hailed as the most beautiful coal mine in the world. At its peak, Zollverein was one of the largest and most productive mines in Europe, and the adjacent coking plant processed coal into coke for the steel industry. The mine closed in 1986, the coking plant in 1993, and UNESCO listed the complex in 2001.
Read the complete Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in is where the day begins. Next is Duisburg-Werthausen.
Werthausen sits on the left bank of the Rhine in Duisburg, across the river from the steelworks, harbour cranes and bridges of one of Europe's great industrial cities. It is an unexpected place to look for Rome, but the Lower Rhine was the frontier of the Roman Empire for centuries, and the line of forts, fortlets and watch posts along it is now inscribed on the UNESCO list as the Frontiers of the Roman Empire, the Lower German Limes. The site at Werthausen is one of these components, part of the chain of military posts that watched the river between the legionary bases at Neuss and Xanten.
Read the complete Duisburg-Werthausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Duisburg-Werthausen comes up 30 km in. Next is Alpen-Drüpt.
On the flat farmland of the Lower Rhine, between Alpen and Rheinberg, there is little to catch the eye: fields of maize and potatoes, poplars along ditches, brick farmhouses and the occasional windmill. Yet this was once the edge of the Roman world. The Rhine formed the frontier of the empire, and along its banks the Romans built legionary fortresses, forts, watchtowers and temporary camps. Alpen-Drüpt is one of the sites included in the Frontiers of the Roman Empire, Lower German Limes, inscribed by UNESCO in 2021; like many on the list, it survives mainly below ground, known from aerial photographs and excavations rather than standing ruins.
Read the complete Alpen-Drüpt write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
60 km in you reach Alpen-Drüpt. Next is Kalkar-Bornsches Feld.
Kalkar sits on a low terrace a few kilometres from the Rhine, close to the Dutch border, and everything about the landscape here is flat, wide and bright. The label points to the Bornsches Feld, a field on the edge of town that belongs to the Roman Lower Germanic Limes, the frontier that followed the Rhine itself rather than a wall or a palisade. UNESCO added the whole line to its list in 2021. Here, as elsewhere along the lower river, the Roman forts and camps stood on the river bank, the water served as the barrier, and what remains today is mostly in the ground and in the museums of Xanten, a little way up the Rhine.
Read the complete Kalkar-Bornsches Feld write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kalkar-Bornsches Feld, about halfway. Next is back through Alpen-Drüpt.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Alpen-Drüpt write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Alpen-Drüpt sits at 121 km, about halfway. Next is back through Duisburg-Werthausen.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Duisburg-Werthausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Duisburg-Werthausen comes up 151 km in. Next is Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in closes the day.
Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in → Duisburg-Werthausen is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Duisburg-Werthausen → Alpen-Drüpt is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Alpen-Drüpt → Kalkar-Bornsches Feld is 19 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Kalkar-Bornsches Feld → back through Alpen-Drüpt is 20 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Alpen-Drüpt → back through Duisburg-Werthausen is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Duisburg-Werthausen → Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex in is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.