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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
55 km one way from Åndalsnes - plan on about 1 h 07 of riding. The climb of the day is Trollstigen. It tops out at 858 m. Trollstigen is subject to seasonal closure - check it is open before you set off. The passes are the reason to go.
The ground tilts up and stays tilted for 81 km. 848 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.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
182 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.
Åndalsnes is a small town at the head of the Romsdalsfjord, hemmed in by some of the most vertical mountains in Norway. The Romsdalshorn, a sharp pyramid of rock, rises above the valley to the south, and the Trollveggen, Europe's tallest vertical rock face at around a thousand metres, stands a short way up the valley. The town itself is modest, with a few thousand people, a railway terminus, a harbour and a handful of cafes, and its main business is welcoming people who come for the mountains.
Read the complete Åndalsnes write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Åndalsnes is where the day begins. Next is Trollstigen viewpoint, climbing 848 m.
The Trollstigen Plateau is a bare, glacier-scoured saddle at 858 metres, ringed by peaks with names like Bispen, the Bishop, and Kongen, the King, and the viewing platform here, a sculptural structure of steel and concrete that hangs over the drop, is the best place to understand what the road does. Below, the Trollstigen, the Troll's Ladder, zigzags down the side of the valley in eleven hairpins, with the long white thread of the Stigfossen waterfall falling beside it, and beyond lies the broad green Isterdalen and the far peaks of Romsdalen.
Read the complete Trollstigen viewpoint write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
You top out at 858 m here. The road climbs 848 m on the way up to it, steadily. Reckon on about 6 °C colder than the valley, and more in the wind. Nothing on this route is higher. Next is Valldal, mostly downhill.
Valldal is a small town at the head of the Norddalsfjord, in the green and orderly farmland that lies at the foot of the great Sunnmøre mountains, and it is the first proper settlement you reach after the long descent from the Trollstigen. Valldal is famous in Norway for its strawberries, which ripen in July in the long summer light and are sold in roadside stands, and the local people take a great deal of pride in them.
Read the complete Near Valldal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 55 km. You lose 838 m on the way down to it, steadily.
Åndalsnes → Trollstigen viewpoint climbs about 848 m in 17 km. This is the part worth slowing down for - look through the bends and use the pull-offs.
Trollstigen viewpoint → Valldal drops about 838 m over 38 km. Brakes and eyes forward; the views are behind the corners, not in them.