Look for a faint rectangle in the rough grass north of the Military Road, a few kilometres west of Chollerford, and you will have found Brown Dikes, one of a cluster of Roman temporary camps on the high ground above the North Tyne. Nothing stands here, no walls or gates, only low earthworks that the grazing sheep have softened over nearly two thousand years. But these camps are among the most evocative traces of the Roman army in Britain, because they mark where soldiers actually slept and worked while the frontier was being built and garrisoned.
The site lies on the broad shoulder of land between the North Tyne and the crags further west, close to the fort of Brocolitia at Carrawburgh with its famous temple of Mithras. The landscape is open moorland and rough pasture, with stone walls running across it, small plantations of conifers, and a sky that seems far bigger than it should. Lapwings tumble over the fields in spring, and in late summer the heather on the higher ground turns purple. Weather moves quickly; one moment the view stretches to the Cheviots, the next you are inside a cloud.
The B6318 carries you here and is the best motorcycle road in the area by some distance. It follows the Wall closely, rising and falling over a long series of crests with fast, open curves and occasional sharp kinks where it meets a farm entrance or a bridge. Visibility over the crests is limited, so do not let the rhythm lull you. Traffic is light outside the summer high season, but watch out for walkers crossing to the Wall path, cyclists on the Hadrian's Cycleway and sheep that wander through gaps in the fences.
Haydon Bridge, about six kilometres south in the Tyne valley, has a few shops and a pub, and Hexham, around eleven kilometres away, is the proper market town with fuel stations, cafés, bakeries and its splendid abbey. Chollerford, with the remains of the fort of Chesters nearby, has a hotel and seasonal tearooms. A good plan is to stop here briefly, walk out to trace the camp outline, then ride on to Carrawburgh and Housesteads, where the Roman story becomes more visible.