Noeux-les-Mines stands between Béthune and Lens, and its skyline is dominated by two things: tall slag heaps, the terrils, and the old pithead structures that survive from the coal years. It is the surviving heart of a mine, with its headframe, winding house, baths and offices, plus the housing, school and church that went with it. The UNESCO listing of 2012 includes the Noeux-les-Mines area among its many components, for the sake of the whole landscape rather than any one building.
The Compagnie des mines de Béthune ran many of the pits here, and its engineers built a town in brick to serve them. The lines of cottages with their long gardens are reminders that miners kept vegetables, rabbits and pigeons. Racing pigeons were a passion in the mining villages. A little north-west, Béthune has a handsome belfry and a market square that was rebuilt in a Flemish style after the First World War, when the front line ran only a few kilometres to the east.
That front line is the other great story. To the south, the high ridge of Notre-Dame de Lorette holds the largest French military cemetery, with tens of thousands of graves, and a ring of remembrance beside it lists the names of the soldiers who died in the region. It is a short ride away, on straight roads and gentle hills, and silent in a way few places are. The memorial and the cemetery lie on the ridge, with a view over the plain and the terrils.
The riding between the stops is easy, on flat roads with moderate traffic and the occasional cobbled stretch. The surface is generally fine, though agricultural mud collects on the bends in autumn. Noeux-les-Mines has nearly twelve thousand people, so fuel and bakeries are there, along with Sains-en-Gohelle and Hersin-Coupigny nearby. Bring a jacket, because the wind across the plain is cold, and give yourself time at Lorette. It is a long way from a theme park.