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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
326 km from Gravelines to Gravelines, about 5 h 37 of riding. The stops in between: Landhuis met Belfort, Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor, Het Belfort of Halletoren and Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai. It crosses from France into Belgium - carry ID and check the toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 35 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
Gravelines sits right where the river Aa meets the Channel, between Calais and Dunkirk, and it still wears its walls. The town is wrapped in Vauban-era fortifications, a star of brick ramparts, bastions and water-filled moats that you can walk or ride around, and in the middle of it rises the belfry, one of the towers listed by UNESCO among the belfries of northern France and Belgium. It is a solid, sober tower rather than a showpiece, built to watch, warn and ring the hours for a frontier town that changed hands more than once.
Read the complete Beffroi de Gravelines write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de Gravelines is where the day begins. Next is Landhuis met Belfort.
Veurne's market square is one of the most complete in Flanders, and the old Landhuis, with its belfry rising behind it, is the reason. The Landhuis was the seat of the castellany, the regional administration that governed the surrounding countryside, and its belfry is part of the group of Belgian and French belfries protected by UNESCO. Around the square stand the town hall, the old meat hall and a row of gabled houses, many dating back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when Veurne was under Spanish rule, which explains the stepped gables and ornate facades.
Read the complete Landhuis met Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Landhuis met Belfort comes up about 52 km into the recorded legs. Next is Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor.
Every evening at eight o'clock, traffic stops under the Menin Gate in Ypres, and buglers from the local fire brigade sound the Last Post in memory of the soldiers of the British Empire who died in the Ypres Salient during the First World War. The ceremony has been held almost every evening since 1928, interrupted only during the German occupation in the Second World War, and it draws crowds of all ages, many of them descendants of the fallen. The gate itself is inscribed with the names of more than fifty thousand soldiers whose bodies were never found. It is one of the sites included in the World Heritage inscription of the Funerary and Memory Sites of the First World War, inscribed in 2023.
Read the complete Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 91 km into the recorded legs you reach Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor. Next is Het Belfort of Halletoren.
On the Grote Markt of Kortrijk a tower stands alone in the middle of the square, as if the building it belonged to had wandered off. In a sense it did. The Belfort, or Halletoren, was once part of the cloth hall, the trading heart of a medieval textile town, and when the hall disappeared the tower stayed. It is one of the belfries of Belgium and France on the UNESCO list, and it has a pair of local celebrities at the top: two gilded figures, Manten and Kalle, who strike the hours on the bell. Kortrijk people are fond of them, and you will see their likenesses on all sorts of souvenirs.
Read the complete Het Belfort of Halletoren write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Het Belfort of Halletoren, about halfway. Next is Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai.
Five towers. That is what everyone remembers about Tournai's cathedral, and when you first see them rising above the rooftops of this old city on the Scheldt, they seem almost too many for one building. The cathedral of Notre-Dame is one of the great churches of Europe, with a massive Romanesque nave and transept from the twelfth century and a later Gothic choir, tall and light, built in the following century. The combination is a lesson in medieval architecture, and it earned the building a place on the UNESCO World Heritage list. It has been under long restoration after a storm in 1999 damaged the structure, so parts may be covered in scaffolding when you visit.
Read the complete Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai sits at 163 km, about halfway. Next is back through Het Belfort of Halletoren.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Het Belfort of Halletoren write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Het Belfort of Halletoren comes up about 197 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 233 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor. Next is back through Landhuis met Belfort.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Landhuis met Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Landhuis met Belfort, late in the day. Next is Beffroi de Gravelines.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de Gravelines write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 326 km.
Beffroi de Gravelines → Landhuis met Belfort is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Landhuis met Belfort → Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor → Het Belfort of Halletoren is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Het Belfort of Halletoren → Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai → back through Het Belfort of Halletoren is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Het Belfort of Halletoren → back through Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Funerary and memory sites of the First Wor → back through Landhuis met Belfort is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Landhuis met Belfort → Beffroi de Gravelines is 52 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.