Around Lens the slag heaps rise from the plain like a chain of black pyramids, and the twin cones at Loos-en-Gohelle, among the highest in Europe, are visible for miles. The Cité du Moulin sits in this landscape at Fouquières-lès-Lens, next to Harnes and Billy-Montigny, one of the pit villages built by the mining companies and now part of the UNESCO-listed mining basin. It is a quiet residential area today, but its streets tell the story of the coalfield's most terrible moment.
On 10 March 1906, an explosion tore through the galleries of the Courrières mining company, whose pits lay around these towns. More than a thousand miners died, making it the worst mining disaster in European history. Days later, survivors who had been lost underground for three weeks emerged, and the anger that followed the slow and confused rescue effort sparked strikes across the region. Memorials and a mass grave in nearby Méricourt keep the memory alive, and families here still know the names.
Today the area is reinventing itself. Lens has the Louvre-Lens, a branch of the great Paris museum built on the site of a former pit, its long glass and aluminium halls displaying masterpieces in a vast single gallery. The Stade Bollaert-Delelis is the home of RC Lens, whose fans, many descended from Polish and Italian miners, are among the most passionate in France. The slag heaps have become nature reserves, with rare plants and birds, and some can be climbed for views across the flat land.
For riding, expect flat roads, roundabouts, cobbles in old streets and plenty of traffic around Lens and Hénin-Beaumont. Wind sweeps across the plain and rain is frequent. The appeal lies in the history and the strange beauty of the slag heaps at sunset. Fuel and food are easy to find: Harnes and Fouquières-lès-Lens have shops and stations, and Lens has everything. Try a plate of frites with a carbonnade, or a slice of tarte au maroilles. If you have time, combine the cité with the Louvre-Lens and a ride up to the twin slag heaps; between them, they tell the story of a region that went down into the earth and came back up.