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.
From Tournai it runs 252 km to Tournai; allow about 4 h 08 of riding. On the way it passes Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune, Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de and back through Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune. It crosses from Belgium into France - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Tournai is one of the oldest towns in Belgium, and it does not shout about it. Sitting on the Scheldt, which the French-speaking locals call the Escaut, it was a Roman settlement, then the first capital of the Franks: Childeric I, father of Clovis, was buried here, and when his tomb was found in 1653 it yielded gold, jewels and hundreds of golden bees that later inspired Napoleon's imperial emblem. The belfry on the Grand-Place was begun in the late twelfth century and is considered the oldest in the country. Climb its two hundred and fifty-odd steps and you look down on a town of grey stone and slate, and straight across at the five towers of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, a Romanesque and Gothic giant listed by UNESCO in its own right.
Read the complete Beffroi de Tournai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de Tournai is where the day begins. Next is Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune.
Béthune was a mining town on the edge of the Artois, and Pit Number 9 of the Béthune company is one of the surviving complexes that UNESCO included in its listing of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin. A mining complex is more than a hole in the ground: there were the winding house and headframe, the screening and washing plants, the offices, the baths where miners scrubbed off the coal dust, the stables for the pit ponies and the railway sidings, and many of these structures stand near Vermelles. Brick, steel and slag dominate the scene, and a sense of effort and anonymity hangs over it.
Read the complete Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune comes up about 58 km into the recorded legs. Next is Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de.
On 26 March 1918, with the German spring offensive smashing through the British lines and threatening to split the Allied armies apart, French and British leaders met in the town hall of Doullens, a small town on the river Authie, north of Amiens. In a room on the first floor, they agreed to give the French general Ferdinand Foch the coordination of all Allied forces on the Western Front, a decision that many historians see as a turning point of the war. The room, now known as the Salle du Commandement Unique, can still be visited, with a stained glass window commemorating the meeting. The belfry of the old town hall, a solid tower from the late Middle Ages, is part of the UNESCO group of belfries of Belgium and France.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 126 km into the recorded legs you reach Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de. Next is back through Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune, late in the day. Next is Beffroi de Tournai.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de Tournai write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Beffroi de Tournai. That is the ride.
Beffroi de Tournai → Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune is 58 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune → Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de is 68 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’ancienne maison communale de → back through Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune is 69 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ensemble minier du n°9 de Béthune → Beffroi de Tournai is 58 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.