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 Bruay-la-Buissière it runs 275 km to Bruay-la-Buissière; allow about 4 h 44 of riding. The stops in between: Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières, Ensemble minier des Argales, Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat and Beffroi de Mons. 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.
This was once a landscape of pits, headframes and long rows of brick miners' housing, and in 2012 the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin was added to the UNESCO list as a cultural landscape. The stadium or park in the label is part of that story in a quieter way, because company towns like Bruay built sports grounds, brass bands and parks for their workers, and the community life around a pit was as important as the pit itself.
Read the complete Stade Parc write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Stade Parc is where the day begins. Next is Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières-.
On 10 March 1906 a fire in a pit at Courrières, a few kilometres from here, set off a coal-dust explosion that ran through the galleries of three linked mines and killed 1,099 men and boys. It is the worst mining disaster in European history. Rescue teams came from Germany's Westphalian coalfield and worked alongside French crews, a rare moment of cooperation between two countries that would be at war within a decade. Twenty days after the explosion, thirteen survivors were found alive, which astonished the country. The disaster led to strikes and a national debate on safety and the role of the state, with the interior minister, Georges Clemenceau, sending troops to the area, and it changed mining law in France.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- comes up about 34 km into the recorded legs. Next is Ensemble minier des Argales.
At Rieulay, in the middle of the Scarpe valley, the terril des Argales is one of the largest spoil heaps in France, a vast, flat-topped plateau of mining waste stretching for well over a kilometre. Once a stark, black wasteland, it has been transformed into a nature and leisure area, with a lake at its foot, trails, viewpoints and a nature reserve where rare plants and birds have found a home. The site, together with nearby mining remains, is part of the Nord-Pas-de-Calais Mining Basin, listed by UNESCO in 2012.
Read the complete Ensemble minier des Argales write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 69 km into the recorded legs you reach Ensemble minier des Argales. Next is Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat.
At Condé-sur-l'Escaut, right on the Belgian border, the coal basin of northern France reaches its eastern end, and the old mining site of Chabaud-Latour shows how industry and nature have come to terms. A pit operated here for decades, and today what remains is a landscape of slag heaps, ponds formed by mining subsidence, woods and wetlands, part of the UNESCO site of the Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat, about halfway. Next is Beffroi de Mons.
Belgium has many belfries, but only one in the baroque style, and it rises above Mons on the hill where the medieval castle stood. Built in the seventeenth century, it is about eighty-seven metres tall, with a carillon of forty-nine bells, and it was listed by UNESCO with the other belfries of Belgium and France. A lift takes visitors to the top, where the view stretches across the Borinage, the old coal-mining country around the city, and over the rooftops of the old town. Inside, an interpretation centre tells the story of the tower.
Read the complete Beffroi de Mons write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Beffroi de Mons sits at 138 km, about halfway. Next is back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat comes up about 173 km into the recorded legs. Next is back through Ensemble minier des Argales.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Ensemble minier des Argales write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 207 km into the recorded legs you reach back through Ensemble minier des Argales. Next is back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières-.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières-, late in the day. Next is Stade Parc.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Stade Parc write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
The route ends here after 275 km.
Stade Parc → Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- → Ensemble minier des Argales is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Ensemble minier des Argales → Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat → Beffroi de Mons is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Beffroi de Mons → back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Chabaud-Lat → back through Ensemble minier des Argales is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Ensemble minier des Argales → back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Paysage et ensemble miniers de Fouquières- → Stade Parc is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.