Why this ride
267 km from Doullens to Doullens, about 4 h 36 of riding. On the way it passes La citadella d’Arras, Cité du Pont, Cités de Guesnain and Château Dampierre. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Beffroi de porte de Lucheux and Château Dampierre
Plan this ride
- Recorded distance
- 267 km
- Riding-time estimate
- 4 h 36
- Journey
- Recorded itinerary
Distance and timing basis
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.
Waypoint introductions and full write-ups
1. Beffroi de porte de Lucheux
Lucheux is a small village in a wooded valley in the north of the Somme, close to the border with the Pas-de-Calais, and its belfry is something of an oddity. Rather than rising above a town hall or a market square, as in the larger towns of Flanders and Picardy, it is built into a fortified gateway, a stout stone tower straddling the road through the village. It is part of the group of belfries of Belgium and France listed by UNESCO, a symbol of the civic freedoms that towns and villages won from their feudal lords in the Middle Ages. Above the village stand the ruins of a castle that belonged to the Counts of Saint-Pol, with a great hall and towers in a romantic state of decay.
Read the complete Beffroi de porte de Lucheux write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Beffroi de porte de Lucheux is where the day begins. Next is La citadella d’Arras.
2. La citadella d’Arras
The people of Arras call their citadel la belle inutile, the beautiful useless one, and they say it with affection. Vauban built it in the late seventeenth century, after Louis XIV took Artois from Spain, as part of the chain of fortresses meant to lock France's northern border. Its star-shaped ramparts, bastions and moats are textbook Vauban, but the border moved north before the fortress ever saw a serious siege, hence the nickname. It is one of the twelve sites grouped as the Fortifications of Vauban on the UNESCO list since 2008. Its later history is darker: during the Second World War, the Germans executed resistance fighters in the moat, and a memorial there lists their names.
Read the complete La citadella d’Arras write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
La citadella d’Arras comes up about 31 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cité du Pont.
3. Cité du Pont
Wingles sits on the northern edge of the coal basin, between Lens and La Bassée, where the mining towns give way to the canals and fields of the Weppes and the outskirts of Lille. The Cité du Pont is one of its miners' settlements, rows of brick houses built for the workers of the local pits, and it is part of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin World Heritage site. The name, the bridge settlement, hints at the importance of the waterways that crisscross this flat land.
Read the complete Cité du Pont write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 62 km into the recorded legs you reach Cité du Pont. Next is Cités de Guesnain.
4. Cités de Guesnain
A kilometre down the road from the workers' housing of Guesnain stands the best place in France to understand what coal really meant. The Centre Historique Minier at Lewarde occupies the old Delloye pit, which closed in 1971, and it walks you through the whole life of a mine: the lamp room, the showers where miners hung their clothes on chains up to the ceiling, the stables for the pit ponies, and a reconstructed gallery underground where you hear the noise of the picks and the creak of the props. Come here first, and every terrace and terril you pass afterwards will make more sense.
Read the complete Cités de Guesnain write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Cités de Guesnain, about halfway. Next is Château Dampierre.
5. Château Dampierre
Anzin, on the northern edge of Valenciennes, is where coal mining in northern France began on an industrial scale. In the eighteenth century, the Compagnie des mines d'Anzin became one of the largest companies in France, and its mines, workers' housing, slag heaps and buildings shaped the landscape of the region. Château Dampierre is one of the buildings linked to that history, and it is part of the UNESCO listing of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin, inscribed in 2012, which preserves more than a hundred sites across a vast area: pits, headframes, miners' cités, churches, schools and the great black spoil heaps known as terrils. The big miners' strike at Anzin in 1884 helped inspire Émile Zola's novel Germinal.
Read the complete Château Dampierre write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
Château Dampierre sits at 139 km, about halfway. Next is back through Cités de Guesnain.
6. back through Cités de Guesnain
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cités de Guesnain write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through Cités de Guesnain comes up about 166 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Cité du Pont.
7. back through Cité du Pont
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cité du Pont write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
about 204 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Cité du Pont. Next is back through La citadella d’Arras.
8. back through La citadella d’Arras
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete La citadella d’Arras write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
back through La citadella d’Arras, late in the day. Next is Beffroi de porte de Lucheux.
9. Beffroi de porte de Lucheux
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de porte de Lucheux write-up.
Recorded stop-planning note
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Planning note
The route ends here after 267 km.
Leg by leg
Beffroi de porte de Lucheux to La citadella d’Arras
Beffroi de porte de Lucheux → La citadella d’Arras is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
La citadella d’Arras to Cité du Pont
La citadella d’Arras → Cité du Pont is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cité du Pont to Cités de Guesnain
Cité du Pont → Cités de Guesnain is 39 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cités de Guesnain to Château Dampierre
Cités de Guesnain → Château Dampierre is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Château Dampierre to back through Cités de Guesnain
Château Dampierre → back through Cités de Guesnain is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cités de Guesnain to back through Cité du Pont
back through Cités de Guesnain → back through Cité du Pont is 38 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cité du Pont to back through La citadella d’Arras
back through Cité du Pont → back through La citadella d’Arras is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through La citadella d’Arras to Beffroi de porte de Lucheux
back through La citadella d’Arras → Beffroi de porte de Lucheux is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.