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 one-way ride of 569 km, Chur to Sargans - roughly 8 h 55 in the saddle. The stops in between: Mesocco and Thusis. The climbs: San Bernardino pass road, Splügenpass hairpins, Arlberg option and Silvretta High Alpine Road. It tops out at 2,114 m. San Bernardino Pass, Splugen Pass, Arlberg Pass and Bielerhohe are open in summer only - check it is open before you set off. It crosses from Switzerland into Austria - carry ID and check vignette or toll rules. It is a high-mountain day.
The ground tilts up and stays tilted for 114 km. 1473 m of it, taken steadily rather than in one wall. A steady rhythm suits this better than bursts. The height arrives whether you hurry or not.
Cold comes early up here and stays late. Ride it with something in reserve: the summit is not the end of the work, only the middle of it. The last of the trees go and the road runs out onto open ground. The summit sits at 2066 m, and what surrounds it is rock, weather and distance.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
For 44 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.
Chur likes to say that it is the oldest town in Switzerland, and the evidence is on its side. People have lived on this spot, where the Plessur river meets the Rhine valley, for around five thousand years, and the Romans put a settlement here, and a bishop's seat followed in late antiquity. Today the city, with about thirty-two thousand people, is the capital of Graubünden, the biggest canton in the country, and the gateway to the great passes and valleys of the east.
Read the complete Chur fuel and status gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Chur fuel and status is where the day begins. Next is San Bernardino pass road, climbing 1473 m.
Before the tunnel, everyone went over the top. The San Bernardino pass, at 2,066 metres, links the upper Rhine valley of Graubünden with Ticino, and has done for centuries, when mule trains carried goods between the north and the south. Since the opening of the road tunnel in 1967, most traffic goes underneath, and the old road is left for those who prefer the view.
Read the complete San Bernardino pass road write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
You top out at 2066 m here. The road climbs 1473 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 10 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. At this height the road is a summer one: snow gates can stay shut into June and shut again in October. Next is Mesocco, mostly downhill.
Mesocco is a valley village of about thirteen hundred people on the southern side of the San Bernardino, in the Misox, the Italian-speaking arm of Graubünden that opens toward Bellinzona and Lake Maggiore. At nearly eight hundred metres it is the last place of any size before the road climbs to the pass, and it is the right place for a breakfast or a late lunch, with a handful of simple restaurants and cafés serving polenta, cheese, local salami and chestnut dishes, and a small stretch of fuel and shops.
Read the complete Mesocco food reset write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
A break here. You lose 1276 m on the way down to it, steadily. Reckon on about 2 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Next is Splügenpass hairpins, climbing 1324 m.
The Italian side of the Splügen is the one that makes people swear with happiness. From Campodolcino the road climbs the Valle Spluga in a rapid string of tight hairpins, stacked one above another up the valley wall, past waterfalls and a gorge that the old road builders had to blast through. At the top, at about 2,114 metres, you arrive at the border, a modest customs building and the long, cold Lago di Montespluga, held back by a dam and glinting in a bare landscape of grass and stone.
Read the complete Splügenpass hairpins write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The high point of this section, 2114 m up. The road climbs 1324 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 11 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Nothing on this route is higher. Next is Thusis return, mostly downhill.
Thusis is a gateway town, and it knows its job well. It sits where the Hinterrhein, the young Rhine, comes out of the gorge of the Viamala and into the wide, orchard-lined valley of the Domleschg, and from here roads and railway lines fan out into the Graubünden mountains: south over the Splügen and San Bernardino passes, east through the Schin gorge toward the Albula and Davos. At about seven hundred metres in altitude, it is a fairly low base for such high terrain, and that makes it a useful place to be at the start of a mountain day.
Read the complete Thusis write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
You lose 1394 m on the way down to it, steadily. Next is Back to Chur fuel.
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.
The route ends here after 678 km. Next is Sargans.
Sargans is a small town doing something unexpectedly big. It sits on a low saddle in the Rhine valley where the river, instead of flowing on west toward Lake Constance as it now does, once could just as easily have turned toward the Walensee and Zurich. The ridge between the two directions is barely a rise in the ground, which is why geographers like to point at Sargans and say the whole river's fate depended on a patch of gravel. Today the Rhine runs north, and the town's modest castle on its rocky knoll watches over the valley and the Liechtenstein hills across the water.
Read the complete Sargans fuel gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Fill up here — 308 km left and no pump marked after this. Next is Bludenz food stop.
Bludenz sits at the meeting of several valleys, and that is its whole story. The Walgau runs northwest toward the Rhine, the Klostertal heads east to the Arlberg, the Brandnertal climbs south to the Lünersee, and the Montafon carries the Ill river up to the Silvretta. At 588 metres, the town is a low point in a landscape of high peaks, with the Rätikon walls rising behind the old centre and a compact medieval core of arcades and painted houses. It is an ideal place to begin a ride into the mountains.
Read the complete Bludenz food stop write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Somewhere to get off the bike, about 284 km into the recorded legs. Next is Arlberg return option, climbing 1205 m.
Anton, where the road begins its climb. It is one of the oldest crossing points in the Eastern Alps, used since the Middle Ages by traders and pilgrims, and the name itself is thought to come from the dwarf pines, the Arlen, that grow on the slopes. A hospice was built on the pass in the fourteenth century to help travellers survive the winter, and the cult of St. Christopher that grew up there is still remembered in the name of the village below.
Read the complete Arlberg return option write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The high point of this section, 1793 m up. The road climbs 1205 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 9 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. High enough to hold ice in the shaded corners early and late in the year. Next is Silvretta High Alpine Road, climbing 239 m.
Bielerhöhe is the high point of the Silvretta High Alpine Road, a toll road built in the 1950s to link the Montafon valley in Vorarlberg with the Paznaun valley in Tyrol, and the top at about 2,032 metres sits at the edge of the Silvretta reservoir. The lake, a long, deep blue sheet held back by a dam, is surrounded by bare peaks and small glaciers, and the highest of them, Piz Buin at 3,312 metres, rises to the south beyond the water.
Read the complete Silvretta High Alpine Road write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Silvretta High Alpine Road tops the climb at 2032 m. Next is Montafon overnight base, mostly downhill.
Schruns sits at about 650 metres in the Montafon, a long valley in Vorarlberg, Austria's westernmost state, where the river Ill runs south between the Rätikon and the Silvretta ranges. It is a small town of under four thousand people, with a pointed church tower, wooden chalets and a feel of quiet prosperity, and its sister village Tschagguns lies just across the river. In winter the area is busy with skiers, and in summer with hikers and cyclists, but outside the high seasons it is peaceful, and a good place to sleep after a long day in the saddle.
Read the complete Montafon overnight base write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 498 km into the recorded legs you reach Montafon overnight base. You lose 1382 m on the way down to it, steadily. Next is Back to Sargans, mostly downhill.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Sargans fuel gate write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back to Sargans closes the day.
Chur fuel and status gate → San Bernardino pass road climbs about 1473 m in 70 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
San Bernardino pass road → Mesocco food reset drops about 1276 m over 23 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.
Mesocco food reset → Splügenpass hairpins climbs about 1324 m in 43 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Splügenpass hairpins → Thusis return gate drops about 1394 m over 35 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.
Thusis return gate → Back to Chur fuel is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Back to Chur fuel → Sargans fuel gate is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sargans fuel gate → Bludenz food stop is 59 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Bludenz food stop → Arlberg return option climbs about 1205 m in 35 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Arlberg return option → Silvretta High Alpine Road is 70 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Silvretta High Alpine Road → Montafon overnight base drops about 1382 m over 109 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.
Montafon overnight base → Back to Sargans is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.