CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
The recorded total and the leg detail need reconciliation. Inspect the leg notes before using this record for timing or navigation. 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.
From Hoogstraten it runs 111 km to Hoogstraten; allow about 2 h 21 of riding. It goes by way of Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal, Stadhuis en Belforttoren and back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal. It was put together for the scenery rather than the shortest line.
This part of the ride is 34 km of Wortel → Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal.
Wortel is a village in the Belgian Kempen, near the Dutch border, and it is the Belgian member of a World Heritage group whose other two parts, Frederiksoord and Veenhuizen, lie in the Netherlands. The story begins in 1818, when a Dutch army officer, Johannes van den Bosch, founded the Society of Benevolence, an organisation with the grand idea of rescuing the urban poor by sending them to work on farms in the countryside. The first free colonies were founded in the Netherlands, at Frederiksoord, and in 1822 the society bought land at Wortel, then part of the same kingdom, and opened a colony there. When Belgium split away in 1830 the colony remained in Belgian territory.
Read the complete Wortel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Wortel is where the day begins. Next is Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal.
Rik Van Looy, one of the great Belgian cyclists of the 1950s and 1960s, was known as the Emperor of Herentals, which tells you something about the priorities of this town in the Kempen. Herentals lies on the flat heathland of the province of Antwerp, and in the middle of its market square stands the old town hall, built in the fourteenth century as a cloth hall, a lakenhal, when the town grew rich on wool and weaving. Its belfry is part of the UNESCO listing of belfries of Belgium and France, a symbol of civic pride and of the freedoms that merchants bought from their lords.
Read the complete Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal comes up 30 km in. Next is Stadhuis en Belforttoren.
Lier's Grote Markt is one of those squares that makes you slow down without being asked. In the middle stands an elegant eighteenth-century town hall in pale stone, and grafted onto its side is something much older: a slim Gothic belfry from the fourteenth century, its four corner turrets giving it the look of a castle chess piece. Together they belong to the group of Belgian and French belfries listed by UNESCO, symbols of the moment when medieval towns won their freedoms and built towers to prove it.
Read the complete Stadhuis en Belforttoren write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
60 km in you reach Stadhuis en Belforttoren. Next is back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal, late in the day. Next is Wortel.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Wortel write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Back at Wortel. That is the ride.
Wortel → Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal → Stadhuis en Belforttoren is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Stadhuis en Belforttoren → back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal is 26 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal → Wortel is 34 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.