Just east of Carlisle, near the village of Scotby, the Wall leaves almost no mark on the land. Here, at the western end of the Roman frontier, it was built first of turf and timber before being rebuilt in stone, and much of that stone has since been carried off to build farmhouses, churches and field walls. What survives is mostly buried, a faint line in the pasture or a slight ridge followed by a hedge. The vallum, the great earthwork that ran behind the wall, sometimes shows as a shallow trough in the fields. Yet this quiet stretch is part of the same World Heritage site as the dramatic crags further east, and walking the Hadrian's Wall Path through it gives a sense of continuity across the whole country.
Carlisle, a few kilometres away, was a Roman town called Luguvalium, and later a fortress city disputed between England and Scotland for centuries. Its red sandstone castle and cathedral are well worth a visit, and the Tullie House museum has excellent displays on the Roman frontier and on the reivers, the border raiders who terrorised the region in the late Middle Ages. Carlisle is also the home of Carr's biscuits, founded in the city in the nineteenth century, and the smell of baking sometimes drifts across the town.
The riding here is not about the Wall itself. To the south-east, the A686 climbs from the Eden valley over Hartside into the North Pennines, one of the great motorcycle roads of England, with long sweeping bends, a big climb and huge views across the Solway to the hills of Scotland. The Eden valley has quiet lanes through red sandstone villages and green pastures, and to the north, the border country has empty roads through forest and moor. Avoid the M6 if you can, unless you need to cover ground quickly.
Weather in Cumbria is famously wet, and the Pennines can be cold and windy even in summer, so pack for all conditions. The roads are generally good, but mud from farms and sheep on the moors are common hazards.
Carlisle, with nearly eighty thousand people, has fuel, workshops, shops and plenty of pubs and cafés. A pie and a pint in the city, or a sandwich by the river Eden, makes a good pause before heading east along the Wall.