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.
165 km from Charleroi to Charleroi, about 2 h 51 of riding. On the way it passes Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche, Major Mining Sites of Wallonia, Château de l’Hermitage and back through Major Mining Sites of Wallonia. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Charleroi has a reputation, unfairly earned or not, as one of the grittiest cities in Belgium, and its belfry is a fine reason to look again. Rising from the town hall on the Place Charles II, the belfry was built in the 1930s in an elegant Art Deco style, replacing an older tower, and it is one of the belfries of Belgium and France listed by UNESCO. Its slender shape, topped with a dome and carillon, is a symbol of the city's pride and resilience, and inside, the town hall has a sumptuous Art Deco interior.
Read the complete Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi is where the day begins. Next is Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche.
Once a year, on the Tuesday before Lent, the little town of Binche in Belgian Hainaut goes completely mad. The Gilles, men dressed in costumes decorated with heraldic lions, crowns and stars, wearing wooden clogs, padded humps and, in the afternoon, enormous hats of ostrich feathers, dance through the streets to the beat of drums from dawn until late at night, throwing oranges into the crowd. The carnival of Binche is one of the oldest and most famous in Europe and is listed by UNESCO as part of the intangible cultural heritage of humanity. If you are hit by an orange, it is considered a sign of luck, and throwing it back is not done.
Read the complete Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche comes up about 27 km into the recorded legs. Next is Major Mining Sites of Wallonia.
Grand-Hornu, on the edge of the Borinage coalfield west of Mons, looks less like a coal mine than a neoclassical palace. In the early nineteenth century the industrialist Henri De Gorge built it as a model colliery, with workshops, offices and stables arranged around a vast oval courtyard of brick arches, and hundreds of houses for workers, each with its own garden, laid out in streets around it. It was a revolutionary idea at the time, combining industry and housing in one planned complex. Mining ended in the mid-twentieth century, and after years of neglect the site was restored. Today it houses a museum of contemporary art and a design centre, and it is one of the four Major Mining Sites of Wallonia listed by UNESCO in 2012.
Read the complete Major Mining Sites of Wallonia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 59 km into the recorded legs you reach Major Mining Sites of Wallonia. Next is Château de l’Hermitage.
On the Franco-Belgian border, in a forest that has never much cared which country it is in, a pale classical château stands in a clearing. The Château de l'Hermitage was built in the eighteenth century for the dukes of Croÿ, one of the great aristocratic families of the region, as a refined country retreat, and it sits just inside France, near Condé-sur-l'Escaut, at the edge of the forest of Bon-Secours. The family's title went back centuries, and their estates spread across both sides of what is now the border.
Read the complete Château de l’Hermitage write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Château de l’Hermitage, about halfway. Next is back through Major Mining Sites of Wallonia.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Major Mining Sites of Wallonia write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Major Mining Sites of Wallonia sits at 110 km, about halfway. Next is back through Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche comes up about 139 km into the recorded legs. Next is Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi closes the day.
Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi → Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche → Major Mining Sites of Wallonia is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Major Mining Sites of Wallonia → Château de l’Hermitage is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Château de l’Hermitage → back through Major Mining Sites of Wallonia is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Major Mining Sites of Wallonia → back through Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Binche → Beffroi de l'Hôtel de Ville de Charleroi is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.