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.
264 km from Prudhoe to Prudhoe, about 3 h 44 of riding. It goes by way of Roman fort, Durham Castle and Cathedral, Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp and back through Durham Castle and Cathedral. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Speed drops and stays down. Park rather than crawl through. 29 km through ground somebody thought worth listing. The road passes it rather than bypassing it.
The road west from Heddon-on-the-Wall runs straight as a ruler, and there is a reason for that. The B6318, known locally as the Military Road, was built by General Wade's engineers after the Jacobite rising of 1745 so that troops could move quickly between Newcastle and Carlisle, and for long stretches they laid it right on top of Hadrian's Wall, using the Roman stones as foundation. At Oatens Bank, just beyond Heddon, you ride with the Wall beneath your tyres and the ditch and vallum still visible in the fields beside you, two thousand years of frontier engineering compressed into a few metres.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank is where the day begins. Next is Roman fort.
Newcastle got its name from a castle built in 1080 by Robert Curthose, eldest son of William the Conqueror, but the hilltop he chose above the Tyne had already been used for centuries. Beneath the Castle Keep and the Black Gate lie the remains of Pons Aelius, a small Roman fort that guarded a bridge across the river near the eastern end of Hadrian's Wall. The name honoured Hadrian himself, whose family name was Aelius. Outlines of the fort are marked in the paving around the keep, and the Swing Bridge below crosses the river close to where the Roman bridge stood.
Read the complete Roman fort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Roman fort comes up about 23 km into the recorded legs. Next is Durham Castle and Cathedral.
The river Wear loops around a rocky peninsula in a tight horseshoe, and on top of it, rising above the trees, stand Durham Cathedral and Durham Castle, one of the most impressive views in Britain. The Normans built both in the late eleventh and early twelfth centuries, soon after the Conquest, as a statement of power in the turbulent north. The cathedral is a masterpiece of Romanesque architecture, with massive columns carved with zigzags and spirals, and its stone rib vaults are among the earliest of their kind in Europe, pointing the way to Gothic architecture. Together, castle and cathedral were listed by UNESCO in 1986.
Read the complete Durham Castle and Cathedral write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 53 km into the recorded legs you reach Durham Castle and Cathedral. Next is Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp.
Sunny Rigg is a name that sounds like a farm, and that is more or less what it is, a stretch of rough pasture on the high ground just north of Haltwhistle, in Northumberland, where archaeologists have found the faint outline of a Roman temporary camp. These camps were built by marching armies at the end of each day's journey, with a ditch and a rampart thrown up around the tents to protect them overnight, and they were abandoned the next morning. Most survive only as shallow earthworks or crop marks seen from the air, which is why the places are so evocative: they record a single night of an army's life on the march, two thousand years ago.
Read the complete Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp, about halfway. Next is back through Durham Castle and Cathedral.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Durham Castle and Cathedral write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Durham Castle and Cathedral sits at 183 km, about halfway. Next is back through Roman fort.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Roman fort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Roman fort comes up about 243 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank closes the day.
Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank → Roman fort is 23 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Roman fort → Durham Castle and Cathedral is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Durham Castle and Cathedral → Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp is 80 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Sunny Rigg 3 Roman temporary camp → back through Durham Castle and Cathedral is 80 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Durham Castle and Cathedral → back through Roman fort is 30 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Roman fort → Hadrian's Wall from Oatens Bank is 22 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.