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 92 km one-way ride from near Martigny-Ville, about 1 h 21 of riding. On the way it passes Sion, Salgesch and Leuk. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 2,500 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 29 km this is Grand Tour of Switzerland, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Check the pass is open before you commit to it.
Martigny stands at the elbow of the Rhône, the place where the river turns from a westward run through the Valais to a northward one toward Lake Geneva, and it has been a crossroads since the Romans. They called it Octodurum, built a town, a temple and an amphitheatre here, and the road over the Great St Bernard, which starts at the edge of town, was one of the main routes over the Alps. You can still visit the amphitheatre, and a museum on the Roman site has a collection that is unusual for a town this size.
Read the complete Martigny write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Martigny is where the day begins. Next is Sion.
Sion is the capital of the Valais, the Swiss canton that runs along the upper Rhône between two walls of high mountains, and it is dominated by two hills. On one, the ruins of the Tourbillon castle crown the rock, and on the other, the fortified church of Valère holds what is said to be the oldest playable pipe organ in the world, dating from around the fifteenth century. You climb to it by a steep stone lane, and in summer the organ is used for a festival. The two hills rise straight out of the town and give Sion a theatrical appearance, like a backdrop for something medieval.
Read the complete Sion write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sion comes up about 29 km into the recorded legs. Next is Salgesch.
Salgesch is the wine village at the end of the German-speaking world, or at least at its edge in the Rhône valley. Just downstream, in Sierre, people speak French. In Salgesch, they speak a Valais German dialect and make some of the best Pinot Noir in Switzerland, and the language border runs between them like an invisible fence that nobody has ever bothered to build. The vines grow on steep south-facing terraces above the village, with the Rhône flat and silvery below and the peaks of the Bernese Alps on the other side.
Read the complete Salgesch write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 52 km into the recorded legs you reach Salgesch. Next is Leuk.
Leuk sits on a small hill above the Rhône, with a castle at the top, a church with a tall spire, and a street plan that has changed very little since the Middle Ages. In German it is Leuk, in French Loèche, and the double name tells you where you are: on the language border of the Valais, where the French-speaking lower valley gives way to German. For centuries the town was the seat of a regional government, and the old houses along the main street, with their carved wooden balconies and painted shutters, reflect a prosperous past.
Read the complete Leuk write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Leuk, late in the day. Next is Brig.
Brig is a small town with a big palace, and its position at the foot of the Simplon Pass gives it a significance out of proportion to its size. It sits in the upper Rhône valley in the canton of Valais, where the river runs west to Lake Geneva, and a route over the mountains to Italy has existed here since Roman times. The Stockalperschloss, the biggest private residence in Switzerland when it was completed in the late seventeenth century, was built by Kaspar Jodok von Stockalper, a merchant who controlled the Simplon trade and became the richest man in the country. With its three onion-domed towers, named for the Three Kings, it dominates the old town and is open to visitors.
Read the complete Brig write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Finish at Brig. That is the ride.
Martigny → Sion is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Sion → Salgesch is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Salgesch → Leuk is 7 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Leuk → Brig is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.