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.
From Harnes it runs 180 km to Harnes; allow about 3 h 06 of riding. On the way it passes Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos, Belfort en Stadhuis, \Halletoren\ ou Belfort and back through Belfort en Stadhuis. 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.
Estevelles is a small town where the mining basin meets the waterways of the Deûle, between Pont-à-Vendin and Carvin. The label points to one of the mining ensembles of the area, part of the UNESCO-listed basin: a pit, a cité, perhaps a spoil heap, all together telling the story of how coal shaped every aspect of local life. The mining companies built not only houses but churches, schools, health centres and gardens, controlling their workers' lives from cradle to grave. The cités around here, with their neat rows of brick houses and small vegetable gardens, still house many descendants of miners.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e is where the day begins. Next is Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos.
Loos is a town on the southwestern edge of Lille, and its town hall belfry is part of the same UNESCO family as the medieval towers of Bruges and Ghent, though it is a much more modern member. In this corner of Europe a belfry was the symbol of a town's independence from lord and church, and when the industrial towns of the Nord built new town halls in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they gave them belfries too, as a statement that they had grown up. Loos's tower, in brick and stone, does exactly that.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos comes up about 25 km into the recorded legs. Next is Belfort en Stadhuis.
British soldiers marching to the front in the First World War left Ypres by the road that led east towards Menen, and the gate they passed through became the Menin Gate, now a memorial bearing the names of more than fifty thousand soldiers with no known grave. Menen itself, about twenty kilometres from Ypres, sits right on the French border, on the river Leie, which the French call the Lys, and its town hall and belfry, standing on the market square, are part of the UNESCO listing of the belfries of Belgium and France. The belfry, like much of the town, was damaged in the war and rebuilt, and it remains the proud symbol of the town's civic history.
Read the complete Belfort en Stadhuis write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 54 km into the recorded legs you reach Belfort en Stadhuis. Next is \Halletoren\ ou Belfort.
Tielt is a working town in the heart of West Flanders, a place of farmers' markets, textile history and flat roads, and its belfry rises above the market square like a stubborn finger pointing at the clouds. The Halletoren, the hall tower, stands on top of the old cloth hall, the building where merchants once inspected and traded woollen cloth, the source of Flanders' wealth in the Middle Ages. The belfry is one of the group of Belgian and French belfries that UNESCO listed together, symbols of the civic freedom that the cities of Flanders won from their lords, where the town charters were kept and the bells rang to call citizens to arms or to work.
Read the complete \Halletoren\ ou Belfort write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
\Halletoren\ ou Belfort, about halfway. Next is back through Belfort en Stadhuis.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Belfort en Stadhuis write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Belfort en Stadhuis sits at 120 km, about halfway. Next is back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos comes up about 155 km into the recorded legs. Next is Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e closes the day.
Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e → Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos → Belfort en Stadhuis is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Belfort en Stadhuis → \Halletoren\ ou Belfort is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
\Halletoren\ ou Belfort → back through Belfort en Stadhuis is 36 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Belfort en Stadhuis → back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos is 29 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Beffroi de l’Hôtel de Ville de Loos → Paysage et ensemble miniers d’Estevelles e is 25 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.