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.
322 km from Barlin to Barlin, about 5 h 33 of riding. It goes by way of Cité de la Parisienne, Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille, Het Belfort of Halletoren and Belfort. It crosses from France into Belgium - carry ID and check the toll rules. The line favours views over speed.
Picture a pit village at six in the morning in 1950: men walking to the headframe with their lunch tins, the siren calling the shift, the women already up and stoking the stoves, children getting ready for the company school. The ensemble around Fosse n°7, near Maisnil-lès-Ruitz and Barlin, preserves the setting for that daily routine: the pit buildings, the housing, the paths between them, and the terril rising nearby. It was a self-contained world, owned and run by the mining company, which provided houses, coal for heating, schools, churches and even doctors, in exchange for loyalty and hard work. The site is one of the many components of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin on the UNESCO list.
Read the complete Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7 is where the day begins. Next is Cité de la Parisienne.
Drocourt is the sort of place you could ride through without a second glance, and you would miss a small piece of the story of northern France. The Cité de la Parisienne is a mining housing estate on the edge of the town, a grid of brick houses built by the coal company for its workers and their families, part of the UNESCO-listed Mining Basin. The name comes from the company that dug coal here. Hénin-Beaumont and Rouvroy press in on either side, and the black cones of the slag heaps rise above the rooftops.
Read the complete Cité de la Parisienne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Cité de la Parisienne comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille.
Lille's town hall belfry is a child of the twentieth century. After the old town hall was lost, the architect Émile Dubuisson built a new one in the 1920s and early 1930s in a working-class district south of the centre, and its belfry, rising about 104 metres, is the tallest civic belfry in Europe. Built of reinforced concrete and brick in an Art Deco reinterpretation of the Flemish tradition, it is part of the UNESCO-listed Belfries of Belgium and France, a group that celebrates the towers built by towns to symbolise their freedom and civic pride.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille 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 de Lille. Next is Het Belfort of Halletoren.
On the Grote Markt of Kortrijk a tower stands alone in the middle of the square, as if the building it belonged to had wandered off. In a sense it did. The Belfort, or Halletoren, was once part of the cloth hall, the trading heart of a medieval textile town, and when the hall disappeared the tower stayed. It is one of the belfries of Belgium and France on the UNESCO list, and it has a pair of local celebrities at the top: two gilded figures, Manten and Kalle, who strike the hours on the bell. Kortrijk people are fond of them, and you will see their likenesses on all sorts of souvenirs.
Read the complete Het Belfort of Halletoren write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Het Belfort of Halletoren, about halfway. Next is Belfort.
Ghent has three towers standing in a row, and the middle one is the belfry, rising over the old centre between St Bavo's Cathedral and St Nicholas' Church. Begun in the fourteenth century, it was the town's watchtower, bell tower and strongroom, where the charters granting the city its privileges were locked away. On its spire sits a gilded dragon, the city's mascot, keeping an eye on things. The belfry, with the cloth hall attached to its base, is part of the UNESCO list of belfries of Belgium and France, and you can climb it, partly by lift, for one of the best views over the rooftops, canals and spires.
Read the complete Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Belfort sits at 161 km, about halfway. Next is back through Het Belfort of Halletoren.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Het Belfort of Halletoren write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Het Belfort of Halletoren comes up about 216 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 251 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille. Next is back through Cité de la Parisienne.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Cité de la Parisienne write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Cité de la Parisienne, late in the day. Next is Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 322 km.
Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7 → Cité de la Parisienne is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Cité de la Parisienne → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille → Het Belfort of Halletoren is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Het Belfort of Halletoren → Belfort is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Belfort → back through Het Belfort of Halletoren is 55 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Het Belfort of Halletoren → back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Lille → back through Cité de la Parisienne is 37 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Cité de la Parisienne → Ensemble minier de la fosse n°7 is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.