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: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
406 km from Ostricourt to Ostricourt, about 7 h of riding. The stops in between: Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les, Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la, Beffroi de Bergues and Béguinage de Bruges. It crosses from France into Belgium - carry ID and check the toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
The flat country between Douai and Lens does not look like much from a motorway, but it holds one of the great industrial landscapes of Europe. For more than two centuries coal was dug from under these fields, and the mining basin of the Nord-Pas de Calais was listed by UNESCO in 2012 as an evolving cultural landscape of pits, slag heaps, railway lines and workers' housing. The Fosse Cornuault at Évin-Malmaison is one piece of that vast mosaic, a former colliery site with its associated buildings, set among the brick villages of the eastern part of the basin.
Read the complete Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault is where the day begins. Next is Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les-.
Noeux-les-Mines stands between Béthune and Lens, and its skyline is dominated by two things: tall slag heaps, the terrils, and the old pithead structures that survive from the coal years. It is the surviving heart of a mine, with its headframe, winding house, baths and offices, plus the housing, school and church that went with it. The UNESCO listing of 2012 includes the Noeux-les-Mines area among its many components, for the sake of the whole landscape rather than any one building.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la-.
Aire-sur-la-Lys is the kind of small French town that rewards a slow walk with no plan. Its belfry rises from the eighteenth-century town hall on the Grand Place, an elegant classical building topped by a tall tower with a lantern and a carillon, and it is part of the UNESCO listing of belfries of Belgium and France. Across the square stands the Bailliage, a richly decorated Renaissance building from around 1600, with arches, carved figures and a little loggia, which once housed the guard and the town's officials. A few streets away, the great collegiate church of Saint-Pierre, built in a flamboyant Gothic style, rises above the rooftops.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 71 km into the recorded legs you reach Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la-. Next is Beffroi de Bergues.
Bergues found a new kind of fame in 2008, when the comedy Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis, filmed here, became one of the most successful French films of all time, and suddenly the whole country wanted to see the town where a postman from the south is exiled to the cold north and ends up falling in love with it. The film's best-known scenes include the belfry, from which the hero rings the carillon, and the town still welcomes visitors who come in search of the locations. But Bergues was a proud place long before cinema arrived. It is a small fortified town in French Flanders, surrounded by ramparts and canals, with fortifications improved by Vauban in the seventeenth century.
Read the complete Beffroi de Bergues write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de Bergues, about halfway. Next is Béguinage de Bruges.
The Princely Beguinage of Bruges, Ten Wijngaerde, is the sort of place that makes people lower their voices without being asked. White-washed houses surround a grassy courtyard planted with old trees, and in spring thousands of daffodils bloom under them. A beguinage was a community where lay women lived a religious life without taking full vows, and Flanders had many of them from the thirteenth century. This one was founded around 1245 under Margaret of Constantinople, Countess of Flanders, and the UNESCO listing of Flemish Beguinages covers it, along with Diest and others.
Read the complete Béguinage de Bruges write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Béguinage de Bruges sits at 203 km, about halfway. Next is back through Beffroi de Bergues.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de Bergues write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Beffroi de Bergues comes up about 287 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la-.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 337 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la-. Next is back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les-.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les-, late in the day. Next is Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 406 km.
Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault → Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- → Beffroi de Bergues is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de Bergues → Béguinage de Bruges is 83 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Béguinage de Bruges → back through Beffroi de Bergues is 83 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Beffroi de Bergues → back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville d’Aire-sur-la- → back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Noeux-les- → Ensemble minier de la fosse Cornuault is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.