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 Zürich it runs 364 km to Samedan; allow about 6 h 19 of riding. It goes by way of Schaffhausen, Bodensee, St. Gallen and Appenzell. The highest point is about 2,450 m. Fluela Pass is subject to seasonal closure - check it is open before you set off. It crosses from Switzerland into Liechtenstein - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
The ride follows Grand Tour of Switzerland for 21 km.
For about 43 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it. Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
Zurich is the polite, prosperous kind of city that keeps its history discreet. It lies at the northern end of Lake Zurich, where the Limmat river runs out of the lake and through the old town, and it began as a Roman customs post called Turicum on the hill now known as the Lindenhof. By the sixteenth century it was a centre of the Reformation under Huldrych Zwingli, who preached at the Grossmunster, the twin-towered church that still dominates the skyline. Across the river, the Fraumunster holds stained glass windows by Marc Chagall, and the light inside on a bright morning is worth a short detour.
Read the complete Zurich write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Zürich is where the day begins. Next is Schaffhausen.
The dot lies a few kilometres south of the Rhine in the quiet Unterland of Zurich canton, near the villages of Rorbas and Freienstein, where the Töss river flows through orchards and woods before it meets the larger river. Schaffhausen itself is further north, but this is the stretch of country that leads you to it, with modest farms, half-timbered houses and the Rhine's wide green valley just beyond the ridge.
Read the complete Schaffhausen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Schaffhausen comes up about 37 km into the recorded legs. Next is Bodensee.
Büsingen am Hochrhein is one of Europe's oddities: a German village entirely surrounded by Switzerland, with the Rhine and Swiss fields on every side, and a population of around fourteen hundred. It has its own car plates, uses both euros and Swiss francs in shops, and is part of the Swiss customs area, though it belongs to Germany. Gailingen, next door, has a rich history as the home of the largest Jewish community in Baden, and its old synagogue still stands as a reminder.
Read the complete Bodensee write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 58 km into the recorded legs you reach Bodensee. Next is St. Gallen, 57 km on.
Konstanz and Kreuzlingen are two towns with one street between them. The border runs between buildings, with Germany to the north and Switzerland to the south, and for most of the day people pass through without a glance, going shopping, to work or to a lakeside cafe. Konstanz has about eighty thousand people and a handsome old town on the shore of the Bodensee, while Kreuzlingen is smaller but is the larger of the two Swiss towns on the lake. The Rhine leaves the lake here, flowing west, and the narrow passage between the Obersee and the Untersee is crossed by an old bridge.
Read the complete St. Gallen write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
St. Gallen, about halfway. Next is Appenzell.
Every year on the last Sunday in April, the people of Appenzell Innerrhoden gather in the main square, men and women, many with a ceremonial sword or a bayonet at the hip, and vote with raised hands. The Landsgemeinde is one of the last open-air assemblies of its kind in Switzerland, and it takes place in the middle of this small town, which has been the capital of the half-canton for centuries. Women only gained a vote at the cantonal level here in 1990, after a federal court ruling, which tells you something about how conservative the valley is, and also how proud.
Read the complete Appenzell write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Appenzell sits at 227 km, about halfway. Next is Vaduz.
Liechtenstein is a country you can cross in half an hour, a narrow strip of about twenty-five kilometres between the Rhine and the Austrian border, and Vaduz is its small, tidy capital with just over five thousand people. It sits under a steep hill crowned by the castle of Vaduz, a medieval fortress that is the home of the princely family, and its wide valley is closed in by the high wall of the Rätikon mountains. It is a country of banks, postage stamps, dental products and orderly lawns.
Read the complete Vaduz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Vaduz comes up about 207 km into the recorded legs. Next is Chur.
At 593 metres, in a wide bend of the Rhine valley, Chur makes a strong claim to be the oldest town in Switzerland, with traces of settlement going back thousands of years and a Roman presence from the first century BC. It has been the seat of a bishop since late antiquity, and the bishop's court, with its cathedral, sits on a terrace above the old town. Down below, the narrow streets and squares of the Altstadt, with painted houses, fountains and arcades, are a pleasant place to wander after a morning in the saddle.
Read the complete Chur write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 247 km into the recorded legs you reach Chur. Next is Davos.
Davos sits in a high, broad valley in the Graubünden Alps at about 1,560 metres, and it calls itself the highest city in Europe, a claim that depends on how you count. The dot is a few kilometres off, in the mountains toward Zernez, probably near the Flüela Pass, where the road climbs to over 2,300 metres between rock and tarn, and the landscape is bare and bright. It is a very different place from the town, which is known for the World Economic Forum in January and for the long ski runs on the Parsenn.
Read the complete Davos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Davos, late in the day. Next is St. Moritz, 57 km on.
St. Moritz sits at 1,822 metres in the Engadin, a high, wide valley of larches, lakes and light that people have been praising for centuries. The town's reputation began in 1864, when a hotelier named Johannes Badrutt is said to have bet his English summer guests that they would enjoy the winter in the mountains, and if they did not, he would pay their travel costs. They stayed until Easter, brown from the sun, and winter tourism was born. The Olympic Games came here in 1928 and again in 1948, and the Cresta Run, an ice-cold toboggan track dug into the hillside, has been in use since 1884.
Read the complete St. Moritz write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 364 km.
Zürich → Schaffhausen is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Schaffhausen → Bodensee is 21 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Bodensee → St. Gallen is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
St. Gallen → Appenzell is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Appenzell → Vaduz is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Vaduz → Chur is 40 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Chur → Davos is 70 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Davos → St. Moritz is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.