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.
411 km from Armenia to Armenia, about 8 h 32 of riding. It goes by way of Zone F, Zone C and back through Zone F. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 2,600 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 95 km this is Colombia Coffee Triangle Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Armenia, Colombia, is not the best-known part of the country, but the hills around it are the heart of the Eje Cafetero, the coffee axis. The Coffee Cultural Landscape of Colombia is a UNESCO World Heritage Site made up of several zones, and Zone D lies in Quindío, in the high green country close to Armenia, Circasia and Montenegro. This is where the coffee farms cling to steep slopes, shaded by plantain and tall guadua bamboo, and the farmhouses are painted in bright colours with carved balconies.
Read the complete Zone D write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zone D is where the day begins. Next is Zone F.
Zone F is one of the patches of the Coffee Cultural Landscape of Colombia, a World Heritage site spread across the steep green slopes of the Central and Western Cordilleras. This part lies in western Risaralda, around the towns of Santuario, Apía and La Celia, on hillsides so steep that you wonder how anyone stands upright to pick the beans. The answer is that people have been doing it for well over a century, by hand, on slopes where no machine could follow.
Read the complete Zone F write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zone F comes up about 95 km into the recorded legs. Next is Zone C.
Zone C of the Coffee Cultural Landscape lies north of Armenia, in the steeper, higher country of Caldas, near Filadelfia and Aranzazu. This is the same UNESCO landscape, but it feels different from the Quindío end: the slopes are bigger, the farms more scattered, and the volcano Nevado del Ruiz, which looms to the east, often stands out against the sky on a clear morning. The eruption of that volcano in 1985 caused one of Colombia's worst disasters, and its presence remains part of local life.
Read the complete Zone C write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 206 km into the recorded legs you reach Zone C. Next is back through Zone F.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Zone F write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Zone F, late in the day. Next is Zone D.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Zone D write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Zone D. That is the ride.
Zone D → Zone F is 95 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Zone F → Zone C is 111 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Zone C → back through Zone F is 108 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Zone F → Zone D is 97 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.