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 320 km to Haydon Bridge; allow about 4 h 21 of riding. The stops in between: Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2, Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu and back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Marching soldiers did not sleep in the open. Every night on campaign, a Roman army dug a ditch and threw up a rampart around its tents, and the faint outlines of these temporary camps are scattered across Northumberland, some dating from the conquest of the north, others from the building of the Wall. The camp near the old Grindon school, close to the Stanegate a little north of Haydon Bridge, is one of these. You will need a good map and a low sun to make out its banks.
Read the complete Grindon School Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Grindon School Roman temporary camp is where the day begins. Next is Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2.
Most people picture Hadrian's Wall striding across lonely Northumberland crags. Wall mile 2 is the other end of the story: an urban stretch in the east of Newcastle upon Tyne, where the wall ran from the fort at Wallsend, Segedunum, westwards along the north bank of the Tyne towards the bridge and fort at Pons Aelius, beneath today's city centre. Very little of the wall itself is visible here; terraced houses, roads and shipyards have long since swallowed it. But you are standing on the first miles of a frontier that once ran coast to coast for about eighty Roman miles.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 comes up about 50 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu.
Drumburgh is a few farms and a ruined-looking castle at the edge of the Solway marsh, and it is easy to miss, but it sits on the line of Hadrian's Wall where it slides down to the shore at Bowness. The castle was built from the stones of a Roman fort, called Congavata, and that gives a picture of how much of the frontier went into later buildings. The label places us on a stretch of Wall between Fulwood House and the next landmark, with Parton Roman fort on the far side of Cumbria, a reminder that Hadrian's frontier carried on around the coast.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 160 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2, late in the day. Next is Grindon School Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Grindon School Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Grindon School Roman temporary camp. That is the ride.
Grindon School Roman temporary camp → Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 → Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu is 110 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Hadrian's Wall between Fulwood House at Bu → back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 2 → Grindon School Roman temporary camp is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.