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.
209 km from Mazingarbe to Mazingarbe, about 3 h 43 of riding. On the way it passes Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait, Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul, Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines and back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul. 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.
In the mining towns of northern France, the companies built not only pits and houses but whole communities, with churches, schools, dispensaries and, after the First World War, monuments to the dead. This war memorial and the iron gates of a mining cité in Mazingarbe are small parts of that story, included in the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin World Heritage site. They stand among rows of brick houses, gardens and allotments in a town shaped by coal.
Read the complete Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d is where the day begins. Next is Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait.
Mining companies in northern France did more than dig coal. They built housing, schools, churches, shops and clinics, so that workers' lives were shaped from birth to burial by the company, and the Goutte de Lait, the Drop of Milk, is a piece of that system. The name refers to the charitable clinics set up across France from the late nineteenth century to give mothers advice and clean milk for their babies, in an age when infant mortality was terrifying. In Auchel, the building belonged to the mining community, and it is listed as part of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin.
Read the complete Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait comes up about 26 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 73 km into the recorded legs you reach Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines.
Comines is one of those towns the border runs straight through. The river Lys, the Leie to the Flemish, divides French Comines from Belgian Comines-Warneton, and you can cross from one country to the other on a bridge without noticing much more than a change in the shape of the street signs. On the French side the town hall and its belfry stand over the main square, a tall brick tower in the Flemish style with a pointed roof and a carillon, part of the group of belfries of Belgium and France listed by UNESCO.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines, about halfway. 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.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul sits at 125 km, about halfway. Next is back through Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait comes up about 183 km into the recorded legs. Next is Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d closes the day.
Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d → Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines is 32 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Comines → back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Bailleul is 31 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 Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait is 47 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Bâtiment de la Goutte de Lait → Monument aux morts et grilles de la cité d is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.