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 Annan it runs 177 km to Annan; allow about 2 h 52 of riding. It goes by way of Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La, Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas, Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal and back through Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas. The line favours views over speed.
The Solway Firth is a long, shallow estuary where the tide rushes in faster than a man can run, and at Cardurnock the land finishes in a flat, grassy peninsula that pokes into it. Hadrian's Wall once ran this way along the coast, and the line of the frontier continued along the shore with a series of milecastles and turrets watching the water. Turret 4a is one of those small signal towers, set about every third of a Roman mile, and nothing much remains of it above ground. What there is, instead, is a landscape that explains why the Romans put a tower here: wide, open and exposed, with a clear view over the sea to Scotland.
Read the complete Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a is where the day begins. Next is Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La.
Just east of Carlisle, near the village of Scotby, the Wall leaves almost no mark on the land. Here, at the western end of the Roman frontier, it was built first of turf and timber before being rebuilt in stone, and much of that stone has since been carried off to build farmhouses, churches and field walls. What survives is mostly buried, a faint line in the pasture or a slight ridge followed by a hedge. The vallum, the great earthwork that ran behind the wall, sometimes shows as a shallow trough in the fields. Yet this quiet stretch is part of the same World Heritage site as the dramatic crags further east, and walking the Hadrian's Wall Path through it gives a sense of continuity across the whole country.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La comes up about 32 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas.
Of all the places where Hadrian's Wall still behaves like a wall, Walltown is one of the most dramatic. The masonry rides the crest of the Great Whin Sill, a sheet of hard dark dolerite that pushed up through the surrounding rock about three hundred million years ago and then weathered into a line of cliffs facing north. The Roman engineers simply put their wall on top of the cliff, so the stones rise and fall with the crags, dipping into gaps the locals call nicks and climbing out again. Stand up there on a windy day and look north towards the empty country of Northumberland and you understand exactly why they chose the line.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 59 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas. Next is Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal.
North of Hexham, where the land rises above the Tyne valley, the B6318, the military road built in the eighteenth century partly on top of Hadrian's Wall, runs straight across open country, and here, near the hamlet of St Oswald's, the remains of the wall and the vallum, the great earthwork that ran along its southern side, are clearly visible in the fields. The vallum was a broad ditch flanked by mounds, marking a military zone, and its scale still impresses. This stretch is part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire World Heritage site.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal, about halfway. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas sits at 137 km, about halfway. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La comes up about 144 km into the recorded legs. Next is Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a closes the day.
Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a → Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La → Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas is 27 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas → Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between St Oswal → back through Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Hadrian's Wall between Walltown Quarry Eas → back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La is 28 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between Birky La → Cardurnock Marsh turret 4a is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.