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 Haltwhistle it runs 147 km to Haltwhistle; allow about 2 h 15 of riding. On the way it passes The vallum between the road to Garthside a, Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp, Pasture House turret 3a and back through Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp.
The country around Haltwhistle is where Hadrian's Wall is at its most dramatic. The Romans built it along the Whin Sill, a ridge of hard volcanic rock that rises in a long wall of crags above the farmland, and the ruins of milecastles, turrets and forts run along the top, making a line that climbs and dips like a stitched seam. Haltwhistle claims to be the centre of Britain, which no one can prove, and the town has a quiet, grey-stone high street. A Roman temporary camp, like the one at Chesters Pike, was a marching camp, where an army dug a ditch and raised a bank around a night's lodging, and left almost nothing behind. Often the only trace is a faint rectangle in the grass.
Read the complete Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp is where the day begins. Next is The vallum between the road to Garthside a.
Brampton is a small red sandstone market town at the edge of the Pennines, and just north of it, where the land rises toward the Irthing valley, a stretch of the vallum runs across the fields near Garthside. The vallum, the great ditch and banks that ran south of Hadrian's Wall, is often clearer than the wall itself in this area, because the stone of the wall was carried off long ago to build farmhouses, churches and even a priory. It is part of the Frontiers of the Roman Empire World Heritage Site, and it is best seen in low light, when the earthworks cast long shadows.
Read the complete The vallum between the road to Garthside a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The vallum between the road to Garthside a comes up about 26 km into the recorded legs. Next is Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp.
Carlisle is a border city, and it has been fought over for two thousand years. The Romans founded Luguvalium here to serve the Wall and the road north, and a settlement has stood beside the Eden ever since. The red sandstone cathedral dates from the twelfth century, and the castle beside it held Mary Queen of Scots for two months in 1568, after she fled across the Solway. In 1745 Bonnie Prince Charlie's Highland army took the city on its march into England and lost it on the way back, and the Jacobite prisoners were held in the castle. The names of the old border families, the Armstrongs, Grahams and Nixons, still fill the telephone book.
Read the complete Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 48 km into the recorded legs you reach Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp. Next is Pasture House turret 3a.
A turret on Hadrian's Wall was a small stone tower, about the size of a garden shed, built into the wall itself so that two soldiers could shelter and watch the country. Two turrets stood between each pair of milecastles, spaced about a third of a Roman mile apart, which means a signal could be passed along the wall in minutes by lamp, horn or flag. Turret 3a, near Pasture House on the Solway plain, is one of those tiny posts, and it is a good place to imagine the monotony of the job: a cold, damp night, a wide flat horizon, and the wind in the grass.
Read the complete Pasture House turret 3a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Pasture House turret 3a, about halfway. Next is back through Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp sits at 98 km, about halfway. Next is back through The vallum between the road to Garthside a.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete The vallum between the road to Garthside a write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through The vallum between the road to Garthside a comes up about 119 km into the recorded legs. Next is Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp closes the day.
Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp → The vallum between the road to Garthside a is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
The vallum between the road to Garthside a → Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp → Pasture House turret 3a is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Pasture House turret 3a → back through Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Nowtler Hill 1 Roman temporary camp → back through The vallum between the road to Garthside a is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through The vallum between the road to Garthside a → Chesters Pike Roman temporary camp is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.