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.
299 km from Lens to Lens, about 5 h 09 of riding. The stops in between: Terril 14, Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul, Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort and Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque. It crosses from France into Belgium - carry ID and check the toll rules. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
Lens still wears its history on the surface. The town was flattened in the First World War, which fought over it for most of four years, and rebuilt in brick and concrete in the years after, so what you ride through now is mostly the work of the 1920s and 30s. The Maison syndicale, the union hall, is one of the buildings that belong to that rebuilding and to the world of the pits that surrounded the town, when coal paid the wages and the union bargained for the men who went down. It stands as a reminder that this was a place of organised labour as much as of industry.
Read the complete Maison syndicale Lens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Maison syndicale Lens is where the day begins. Next is Terril 14.
Auchel lies on the western rim of the coalfield, where the black seams run out against the chalk hills of the Artois, and Terril 14 rises above the town and its neighbour Marles-les-Mines as a long, dark ridge softened by birch and grass. The heap is built of shale and waste rock brought up from the pits of the old company that worked this corner of the basin, and like many of the terrils, it has been left to nature since mining ended. Its slopes are now home to plants that love warm, dry ground, and the summit offers a view over the rooftops of the mining towns toward the green hills to the west. It belongs to the vast mining landscape listed by UNESCO in 2012.
Read the complete Terril 14 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Terril 14 comes up about 35 km into the recorded legs. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul.
Bailleul sits in French Flanders, so close to the Belgian border that you can hear Flemish place names on every signpost, and its town hall belfry, rising over the main square with a pointed spire and a carillon, looks every bit as Flemish as the towers of Ypres or Bruges. Like much of the town, it is a rebuilding: Bailleul was almost entirely destroyed in the spring of 1918, during the German offensive in Flanders, and was reconstructed in the 1920s in a neo-Flemish style of brick, stepped gables and decorative stonework. The belfry is one of the belfries of Belgium and France listed by UNESCO.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 78 km into the recorded legs you reach Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul. Next is Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort.
Lo is one of the smallest towns in Belgium, a cluster of brick houses around a market square in the flat polders of the Westhoek, a few kilometres from the French border. Its former town hall, built in the sixteenth century in Renaissance style, has a small belfry tower, and it is part of the UNESCO-listed Belfries of Belgium and France, alongside much grander towers in Bruges, Ghent and Lille. It is a reminder that even tiny towns had civic pride and privileges worth announcing to the world.
Read the complete Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort, about halfway. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque.
The tower of Dunkirk's town hall rises above the centre of a city rebuilt from the ruins of the Second World War, a brick and stone belfry that is part of the World Heritage Site of the Belfries of Belgium and France. Belfries were symbols of civic freedom in the medieval towns of Flanders and northern France, housing bells and sometimes the town's charters, and they stood as proud counterparts to church towers. Dunkirk actually has two listed belfries, the town hall tower and the separate Saint-Éloi belfry beside the church, a reminder of how much these towns valued their bells.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque sits at 150 km, about halfway. Next is back through Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort comes up about 186 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 222 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul. Next is back through Terril 14.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Terril 14 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Terril 14, late in the day. Next is Maison syndicale Lens.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Maison syndicale Lens write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 299 km.
Maison syndicale Lens → Terril 14 is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Terril 14 → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul → Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Dunkerque → back through Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Voormalig Stadhuis met Belfort → back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul → back through Terril 14 is 43 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Terril 14 → Maison syndicale Lens is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.