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.
A 113 km one-way ride from near Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines, about 2 h 11 of riding. It goes by way of Col du Bonhomme, Col de la Schlucht and Grand Ballon. The highest point is about 1,150 m. Col du Bonhomme and Col de la Schlucht are subject to seasonal closure - check it is open before you set off. It suits an unhurried touring pace.
This part of the ride is 17 km of Route des Vins d'Alsace.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
23 km that neither climbs nor drops much. The road settles into the ground rather than fighting it. This is where a day makes up time without anyone trying. Third and fourth, and very little else.
Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines sits in a narrow valley on the Alsace side of the Vosges, with steep wooded slopes rising on both flanks and a small river running through the middle. The name gives away its story. This was silver country, and from the Middle Ages until the sixteenth century miners dug galleries into the hills here, making the valley, the Val d'Argent, one of the richest in the region. Later, textiles took over, and tall old mill buildings still line the town's main street. Visitors can still go underground in an old mine to see the tunnels.
Read the complete Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sainte Marie aux Mines is where the day begins. Next is Col du Bonhomme.
The Col du Bonhomme is a quiet pass in the Vosges, nine hundred and forty-nine metres up on the border between Alsace and Lorraine, where the D415 crosses the main range between Le Bonhomme on the Alsace side and Plainfaing on the Lorraine side. It is not a dramatic pass, with no bare rock or snowfields, but it has the long, steady, forested feel that gives the Vosges their character: dark firs, damp meadows and a wind that smells of resin. The ridge here marked the French border from 1871 until 1918.
Read the complete Col du Bonhomme write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Col du Bonhomme comes up about 17 km into the recorded legs. Next is Col de la Schlucht, climbing 190 m.
The word Schlucht means gorge in German, and the pass takes its name from the deep valley on the Alsace side, a steep, craggy defile that drops away from the col in the direction of Munster. At eleven hundred and thirty-nine metres, it is among the best-known crossings of the Vosges, and it is also the point where the Route des Crêtes, the ridge road that runs along the main crest, meets the road between Gérardmer in the west and Munster in the east. It is a junction, a viewpoint, and a place where nearly every rider on this route pauses.
Read the complete Col de la Schlucht write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 42 km into the recorded legs you reach Col de la Schlucht. Nothing on this route is higher. Next is Grand Ballon, mostly downhill.
The Grand Ballon is the highest summit in the Vosges, at 1,424 metres, and it looks nothing like a ballon in the way you would expect. The name comes from the rounded, treeless shape of the upper slopes, a smooth dome of grass and heather that stands above the forest like the back of a sleeping animal. A radar dome and a few masts sit on top, which spoil the symmetry, but the view makes up for that. On a clear day you can see over the Rhine plain to the Black Forest in Germany and, on the very best days, the white line of the Alps, including Mont Blanc, far to the south-east.
Read the complete Grand Ballon write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Grand Ballon, late in the day. Next is Cernay.
Cernay marks the southern end of the Vosges ridge road, a town of around eleven thousand people on the Thur river, where the mountains drop to the Alsace plain. The old centre has a fortified gate, the Tour de l'Horloge, and a few half-timbered houses, and the town has the practical air of a place that serves a valley. It is also the gateway to a part of the Vosges with a serious past.
Read the complete Cernay write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Finish at Cernay. That is the ride.
Sainte Marie aux Mines → Col du Bonhomme is 17 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Col du Bonhomme → Col de la Schlucht is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Col de la Schlucht → Grand Ballon is 49 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.
Grand Ballon → Cernay is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.