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.
331 km from Bardon Mill to Bardon Mill, about 4 h 23 of riding. The stops in between: Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7, Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce and back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7. The line favours views over speed.
The Twice Brewed inn gives its name to a stretch of Northumberland where the Roman frontier is at its most dramatic. Here the Great Whin Sill, a hard sheet of dark volcanic rock, breaks in a long line of cliffs facing north, and the Wall runs along the very edge of it, rising and falling like a stone roller-coaster. Haltwhistle, five kilometres off, is the nearest town, and Hexham lies a good deal further east.
Read the complete Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp is where the day begins. Next is Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7.
Hadrian's Wall begins its life not on a windswept crag but in the streets of Newcastle, and wall mile 7 runs through the western suburbs around Benwell and Denton, a few kilometres from the city centre. The Romans numbered the miles westward from the fort at Wallsend, and in this stretch the line of the Wall follows the ridge now taken by the West Road. Most of it lies under houses and tarmac, but fragments surface where you least expect them, which is half the fun.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 comes up about 50 km into the recorded legs. Next is Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce.
Across the water from here lies Eastriggs, a quiet Scottish village with a loud past. During the First World War a huge munitions factory stretched for miles along the Solway coast from Gretna to Annan, and the cordite paste that women workers mixed by hand earned the nickname devil's porridge. Thousands lived in purpose-built townships, and the whole operation was kept secret. A museum in Eastriggs now tells the story. The reason the label brings us to the English shore, though, is the Roman frontier, because Hadrian's Wall did not simply stop at Bowness-on-Solway. Beyond it a chain of milefortlets and towers carried on down the Cumbrian coast, watching the sea rather than the hills.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 169 km into the recorded legs you reach Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce. Next is back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7, late in the day. Next is Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp. That is the ride.
Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp → Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 is 50 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 → Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce is 119 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Hadrian's Wall and vallum between the acce → back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 is 109 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
back through Hadrian's Wall in wall mile 7 → Twice Brewed Roman temporary camp is 53 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.