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 Haydon Bridge it runs 118 km to Haydon Bridge; allow about 2 h 00 of riding. The stops in between: Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s, Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel, Watchclose Roman temporary camp and Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp.
Look for a faint rectangle in the rough grass north of the Military Road, a few kilometres west of Chollerford, and you will have found Brown Dikes, one of a cluster of Roman temporary camps on the high ground above the North Tyne. Nothing stands here, no walls or gates, only low earthworks that the grazing sheep have softened over nearly two thousand years. But these camps are among the most evocative traces of the Roman army in Britain, because they mark where soldiers actually slept and worked while the frontier was being built and garrisoned.
Read the complete Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp is where the day begins. Next is Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s.
Long before the wall existed, the Romans ran a road across the narrow neck of northern England, the Stanegate, linking the forts of Corbridge on the Tyne and Carlisle on the Eden. It was built around AD 80, in the time of the general Agricola, and it served as the frontier line for a generation before Hadrian ordered the wall to be built a little to the north. Forts and fortlets sat along it, among them Vindolanda and the small post at Haltwhistle Burn, and temporary camps like the one at Milestone House show where troops stopped on the move.
Read the complete Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s comes up about 13 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel.
West of Birdoswald the Wall changes character. The central crags fall behind, the River Irthing loops through its gorge below, and the frontier runs across gentler farmland towards Banks and Hare Hill, where one of the tallest surviving fragments of the Wall still stands, patched by later hands. Here too the vallum, the great earthwork south of the Wall, can be traced across the fields, and the remains of turrets at Banks East and Pike Hill sit right beside the road. It is a quieter stretch than the famous sections further east, and all the better for it.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 28 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel. Next is Watchclose Roman temporary camp.
East of Carlisle, between the villages of Brampton and Wetheral, the countryside rolls gently towards the Pennines, with green fields, hedges and patches of woodland. Somewhere in these fields lie the faint traces of Watchclose, a Roman temporary camp, one of many marching camps built by soldiers on campaign or during the construction of Hadrian's Wall. These camps were enclosed by a ditch and bank and used for a night or a season, and today they are often visible only from the air or as slight undulations in the grass. Watchclose is part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire World Heritage site.
Read the complete Watchclose Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Watchclose Roman temporary camp, about halfway. Next is Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp.
Not every Roman monument is made of stone. North of Carlisle, on low ground close to the Solway plain, the traces of a Roman temporary camp show up mainly as marks in the ground and in crops: a square or rectangle of ditch and bank, with rounded corners, where an army spent a night or two under leather tents. Nowtler Hill was one of those places. Marching armies built such camps every evening, digging the ditch and piling the earth into a rampart topped with stakes, so that even a short halt was protected.
Read the complete Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp sits at 68 km, about halfway. Next is back through Watchclose Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Watchclose Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Watchclose Roman temporary camp comes up about 77 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 92 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel. Next is back through Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s, late in the day. Next is Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 118 km.
Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp → Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s → Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel is 15 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel → Watchclose Roman temporary camp is 15 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Watchclose Roman temporary camp → Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nowtler Hill 2 Roman temporary camp → back through Watchclose Roman temporary camp is 17 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Watchclose Roman temporary camp → back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel is 15 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the fiel → back through Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s is 15 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Milestone House Roman temporary camp and s → Brown Dikes Roman temporary camp is 13 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.