CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
320 km from Bardon Mill to Bardon Mill, about 4 h 21 of riding. It goes by way of Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6, Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou and back through Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6. The line favours views over speed.
There is not much to see at Bean Burn, and that is rather the point. East of Haltwhistle, in the South Tyne valley a little below the line of Hadrian's Wall, archaeologists have traced the outline of a Roman temporary camp: a rectangle of low banks and ditches, often barely visible except from the air or in raking evening light. Camps like this were thrown up by soldiers on the march or during construction of the Wall, a night's or a season's shelter surrounded by a turf rampart and a ditch, with leather tents pitched inside in neat rows. Northumberland has an unusual concentration of them, and they tell a quieter story than the forts: of thousands of men moving across this landscape, digging in, moving on.
Read the complete Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp is where the day begins. Next is Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6.
If the Wall was the barrier you could see, the vallum was the barrier you were not supposed to cross. This is a great flat-bottomed ditch, about six metres wide, with mounds of earth on either side, and it ran along the south of the Wall for most of its length, forming a kind of military zone behind the frontier. Nobody is quite sure of its purpose, though the usual theory is that it marked the rear boundary of the area and controlled the movement of people and goods. At Benwell, within Newcastle, the vallum has one of its best-known features, a stone causeway that allowed the road to cross the ditch near the fort gate, a neat piece of Roman engineering that came to light in the twentieth century.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 comes up about 50 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou.
The vallum is the strangest part of Hadrian's Wall, and a good place to see it is on the flat ground near Bowness-on-Solway. It is a broad, deep ditch with a flat bottom, flanked by two mounds of earth set back from the edge, and it ran along the south side of the wall for its whole length. Nobody is certain what it was for, but the best theory is that it marked the rear boundary of a military zone, a line that civilians could cross only at controlled points, which fits with the idea of the wall as a border of customs and security as well as defence.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 160 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6, late in the day. Next is Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp. That is the ride.
Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp → Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 → Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou is 110 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Hadrian's Wall vallum between the watercou → back through Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Hadrian's Wall vallum in wall mile 6 → Bean Burn 1 Roman temporary camp is 51 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.