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Bratsberg and Choice Ridge

Bratsberg and Choice Ridge is 47.4 miles of loop riding through Fillmore and Houston Counties in Minnesota — Bluff Country, the Root River valley, the Mississippi bluffs and the ridge roads above them. Moving time is about 58 minutes; allow 85 with stops — a half morning. It is scored CS-4, Twisty: 83 corners, 138° of turning per mile, 2,193 feet of climbing. The roads it uses, in the order you ride them, are in the app.

Curviness
CS-4Twisty · 1.75/mi
Distance
47.4 mi58 min riding
Corners
8348% sharp · Tight
Climbing
2,193 ft46 ft/mi · Steep
Shape
LoopHalf morning
Roads
Backroads100% county & local
Traffic
805vehicles a day, median
Speed limit
60 mphtypically 55
Open this route in the app

About this road

Bratsberg is another Norwegian place-name on the map; the route links it with Choice Ridge through roads that keep the riding lively. Churches, cemeteries, and farmsteads still reflect the Scandinavian settlement wave of the mid-to-late nineteenth century around Bratsberg and Spring Grove. The terrain is fully characteristic of the region—no glacial smoothing, only stream-carved plateau. Place names and architecture continue to signal the ethnic patterns laid down more than a century ago; noticing them adds a human layer to the landform. Continuous direction changes keep the geometry engaging. A strong choice for riders who want continuous road interest together with a visible cultural landscape, without the longer commitment of a full-day expedition. Lively, local, and full of quiet detail around Bratsberg and Choice Ridge.

How it rides

83 corners over 47.4 miles — 1.75 a mile, and 138° of turning for every mile ridden. That scores CS-4, Twisty on the five-point curviness scale. 48% of those corners are sharp ones, and the road reads as tight.

What it climbs

The road climbs 2,193 feet in total, 46 feet per mile, between 708 and 1,315 feet — 606 feet of relief. The longest single climb is 547 feet over 3.0 miles, and the steepest grade on it is 9.1%. By Driftless standards that is steep.

Surface, speed and traffic

Paved end to end. 100% of it is back road rather than highway. Posted speeds run to 60 mph, typically 55, measured across 40% of the route. Where traffic counts exist — 19% of the miles — the median is 805 vehicles a day, busiest at mile 17.1 with 4,457.

Where to stop

1 of the towns on this road has somewhere to stop — 1 fuel, 4 food, 1 bars.

Longest stretch without fuel: 47.3 miles. Worth knowing before you set off if your tank is small.

Listed alphabetically, and chosen by us rather than rated by anybody. The order you reach them, and the mile each one sits at, are in the app.

Worth knowing

Turn-by-turn directions and the spoken guidance are in the app. Every figure on this page is measured from the route itself — corner counts and gradients from the road geometry, elevation from the national elevation dataset, traffic from the state transport departments where counts exist.

Nearby roads