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.
180 km from Carlisle to Carlisle, about 2 h 56 of riding. On the way it passes Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the, Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac, Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5 and back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
East of Carlisle the Eden valley opens into a wide, quiet plain of dairy farms, hedges and red sandstone villages, and Hadrian's Wall crosses it with very little to show. Here the Wall was not built of stone at first. West of the river Irthing the Romans made it out of turf, a sloping rampart of cut sods with timber milecastles, and only later rebuilt it in stone. What survives in the fields around Laversdale is mostly a line of banks and ditches, visible as a ripple in the grass and in the pattern of the hedges, and the road that you follow probably owes its direction to the old frontier. It is a fine place to understand that the Wall was a system, not just a fence: a ditch, a barrier, a patrol road and a back ditch called the Vallum.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd is where the day begins. Next is Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the.
The Romans were obsessed with water, and even on this bleak ridge they went to extraordinary trouble to bring it to their fort. The fort of Great Chesters, called Aesica in Roman times, stood on a crag high above the Haltwhistle Burn, with no spring close enough to supply a garrison of several hundred men and their animals. So the engineers built an aqueduct, an open channel that ran for about eight kilometres, following the contours of the land from a stream to the west, and delivered a steady flow into the fort. It was no great arched structure with spans of stone, but a simple ditch, and its beauty lies in the precision of the gradient. You can still trace the channel as a shallow line in the grass.
Read the complete Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the comes up about 31 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac.
Just north of Hexham, the A road climbs out of the Tyne valley and meets the Roman frontier on a high, windy shoulder of Northumberland. Here, near Acomb, Wall and the crossing of the North Tyne at Chollerford, the line of Hadrian's Wall and its vallum runs across open farmland, sometimes visible as a low bank, sometimes followed by the road itself. Like every stretch of the frontier, it belongs to the UNESCO Frontiers of the Roman Empire, and this middle section is where the wall starts to feel serious, heading west into the wild central crags.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 64 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac. Next is Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5.
Wall mile 5 is in Newcastle, which means that the Roman frontier is under a bus route. The Wall began at Wallsend and ran west, and the antiquarians who surveyed it numbered every Roman mile from there, so mile five falls in Benwell, a hillside district of terraces above the Tyne. Here the old line is now more or less the West Road, a main road into the city, and a short way off the road you can find real Roman stone. A tiny temple dedicated to a local British god called Antenociticus stands in a small garden between modern houses, with its three altars copied in place, and the remains of the Vallum, the broad ditch south of the Wall, crosses a causeway nearby. The fort of Condercum stood on the hill above, with a fine view east down the river.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5, about halfway. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac sits at 137 km, about halfway. Next is back through Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the comes up about 149 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd closes the day.
Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd → Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the → Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac → Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5 is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 5 → back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the trac → back through Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the is 33 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Roman aqueduct to Great Chesters from the → Hadrian's Wall between the road to Laversd is 31 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.