BABBLE Ride, October 17

Yesterday, the newly formed and loosely associated group known as BABBLE had its first ride. BABBLE is Bicycle Authors, Bloggers, Boldfaced Liars and Exaggerators. It was formed by a number of bloggers who write about cycling in the Fort Worth and Dallas areas. We thought it would be cool to get together and take a little ride, have a little lunch, and make up a funny name for ourselves.

We met at the Texas & Pacific Rail Station Park & Ride lot at the south end of downtown Fort Worth. There are about a half dozen of us, so we weren't expecting much of a turnout. Word got out on some other local blogs and message boards, though, and we ended up with lots of unexpected riders- almost 20 of us!


Chris of Pondero blog ponders the collection of bikes.


This is Frankenbike, the creation of Steve A of DFW Point-to-Point. This bike is far uglier in person than than I would have believed from the pictures I've seen. ;-)


Chris's Homer Hilson, on the other hand, is gorgeous.


Mounting up!


This is Rose; her propulsion was provided by her dad, chimericslashes.


Artsy bike picture.


Another one.


Finally we begin.


A motley group.


First stop: Panther City Bicycles.


Refreshments available include Fort Worth-brewed Rahr beer on tap.

Onward we go.


Oops! That was a quick light!


Another stop for the BABBLE posse...


...at Colonel's Bicycles near TCU.


BABBLErs gawking around in Colonel's


Riding near Colonial Country Club.


Getting on the Trinity River Trail at Overton Creek.




We got off the river trail at Trinity Park.




Cutting through the industrial area that leads to...


...La Familia for lunch!


Wish you were here, R A N T W I C K!


The enchiladas were excellent!


A great time was had by all! BABBLE founders include Chandra (Green Commotion, bright yellow shirt), Steve A (DFW Point-to-Point, blue shirt), Myles (Rat Trap Press, red shirt), me- Paul H (Doohickie, next to Myles), then next to me Chris (Pondero) and Reed (ChipSeal). I regret to say I'm not too good with names, so several of our new friends will have to remain nameless for now. Maybe on the next ride I'll be better with names. I also regret that I missed the rest of the ride; I had to get home for another appointment and left the group after eating lunch. I took more pictures of the ride; you can see them here.

If you want to see what happened next, check out some these accounts of the ride:

DFW Point-to-Point
Rat Trap Press
Pondero
Fixed Dallas Twitter
Onespeed Dallas Twitter
fixedminusdicks Twitter Pics
Suburban Assault

The Theme from Shaft

(Caution: slightly not-safe for work language)



...as played by the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. Wow. What kind of encore could you follow that up with? Maybe... this:

Tour de Dallas

So this past Friday, some friends and I rode the Trinity Railway Express (TRE) from Fort Worth to Dallas, then we rode our bikes around White Rock Lake and the surrounding area before heading back to downtown Dallas for lunch and taking the train back home.

My riding buddies planned to board the TRE in downtown Fort Worth, but I had to drop my car off for some maintenance, so I rode the my bike from the dealership to the TRE station at Richland Hills.



For $7.50, you get a day's worth of unlimited transportation on The T (Fort Worth's bus system), the TRE, and DART Buses and Light Rail.



Not being sure how long I would be at the dealer, and not knowing how long it would take me to get to the station and how crowded it would be, I got there pretty early. It gave me a chance to look around. There were real bikes of real commuters locked up!



After almost an hour of waiting, my train arrived.







I found my riding buddies on the train.



We got off at Union Station in Dallas,



which is in the shadow of Reunion Tower.



From there we took the DART Blue Line toward Garland. It was a tighter fit on the light rail, but we still got our bikes on board. Three of the four bikes fit in the area where two cars coupled together.



Finally.... freedom! We got off at the White Rock Lack station and rode over to the lake.



It only took a few minutes to get to the lake.





The weather was PERFECT.





White Rock Lake is surrounded by some of the most gorgeous homes you'll see. We detoured off into the surrounding neighborhood a bit.





This one was ostentatiously called Mount Vernon.



Some other homes in the area. Nice....











We saw this house from both sides. It was freakin' huge!





A brief break...



And we left the lake to follow the White Rock Creek Trail.



(Insert horse's ass joke here ;-)





Once the horse's handler realized I was trying to take a picture, she got it to pose all pretty.



Further up the trail, crossing under Walnut Hill Lane.



We finally stopped and turned around. We were getting hungry.



We rode almost all the way to I-635 at the northern limits of Dallas.



Then it was back to the Blue Line to downtown Dallas. Unlike my riding mates, I didn't get all lycra-ed out.



We ate lunch at Dick's Last Resort. I was too hungry to take pictures. The we rode around in little downtown, taking in the sites like the American Airlines Center where the Mavericks and Stars play.



And just some general wandering, trying to find Union Station again.









And finally, the train ride home.



By my estimate, I did about 45 miles on the bike that day. It was a great day.

Solo Breakfast Ride

I have a great work schedule in that I get every other Friday off. Occasionally I spend some or all of that off-Friday on my bike. This past Friday, I was inspired by Rat Trap Press to check out Benito's on Magnolia in Fort Worth.

Approaching Benito's, coming north on Fairmount.



Fairmount is one of the older residential neighborhoods in Fort Worth. It's best described as "spotty". It's a historic district, so as the homes are fixed up, they are kept true to the flavor of the neighborhood, and there are some truly beautiful homes. But there are also some eyesores that need to be leveled. Anyway, once I got closer to Benito's,



I found out that they don't open until 11 am on weekdays! So I made my way back to 8th Avenue and Park Place.



Because on my way through there earlier I noted that Esperanza's was open.



So I stopped in.



There was no place to lock my Raleigh DL-1 up, so I just left The Old Gentleman out front and grabbed a table near the window.



Looking around the place...





...it looked a little upscale. Luckily they have daily breakfast and lunch specials.



Being Friday, I ordered the "Huevos a la mexicana". For a little price you get a big breakfast!



The food was excellent. I'm not a big fan of hot, spicy food. The eggs had a nice bite to them, but weren't too hot. While I was there, I looked around at the other customers. The place was frequented by a combination of white gringos like myself, and mexicanos, many of them appeared to be workmen who I would think would know where to get the best Mexican food. This restaurant is in a neighborhood boundary area kind of like Filigree describes on her Lovely Bicycle! blog. But here, there wasn't such a stark line between the neighborhoods; there was a little more mixing and transition.

Within a block or two of Esperanza's are several other interesting looking eateries, including the generically named Joe's Italian Restaurant,



Chadra Mezza Grill (next to Herringbone Home Furnishings), serving Lebanese and Italian food,



and the Old Neighborhood Grill



East of 8th Avenue is Fairmount which I described earlier. If you go west down Park Place, you come into Berkeley Place, another older neighborhood. This one is extremely well kept, though, featuring tree-lined streets,





a "vintage" school (Lily B. Clayton Elementary),





and some very nice, well-preserved homes.



I did 23 miles on my Raleigh 3-speed, a nice workout, considering the bike weighs about 50 pounds. Then again, after that breakfast, I needed some exercise. ;- )

The West Side

I took a nice bicycle tour of Fort Worth's west side today. I rode up to the Ridgmar Mall area at the western end of what most people consider the west side, then traveled east to downtown. I didn't take a lot of pictures. Kevin Buchanan at FortWorthology.com does a much better job than me anyway. (I'll link to his posts when we get to something he's discussed.)

Anyway, the first order of business is that I met Miles, an acquaintance from BikeForums, who had driven in to Fort Worth from Cleburne to play some golf over at Z. Boaz, a municipal course. I caught him between the front nine and back nine; he proudly showed me his Raleigh Suberbe which was in his truck in the parking lot.

From there I headed east along the south side of I-30, then swung up through the Cultural District. The construction on the new science museum is nearing completion but the site is still a mess.

I picked up Camp Bowie Boulevard and headed east to the big intersection where it crosses University, Bailey and 7th Street, and proceeded toward downtown on 7th. On the north side of 7th, Montgomery Plaza (built in an old Montgomery Wards warehouse) is open for business, which spurred other development on the south side of the street, creating a new urban living and shopping district between the Cultural District and downtown, including the West 7th and SoSeven.

I rode over the Trinity River on 7th and I was in downtown. I stopped for a snack



at Myles's (no, not the same person as Miles above) favorite Starbucks. After taking that pic I decided to sit outside and found an additional level of security for my bike, courtesy of another Starbucks customer.



The dog barked some, but mostly at the guy who threw a cigarette butt on the pavement when there was a trash can (with an ashtray) not five feet away from where the butt landed. :( I wasn't going to let that ruin my day though.

I got out of downtown the same way I entered, on 7th Street, but then picked up the Trinity River Trail on the west side of the river. I got off at the trailhead between University and Rogers, which will soon be reconstructed to make the crossings under the bridges less steep and improve sight lines to make things safer. I rode through the TCU area (avoiding Rogers hill due to my bad back), then picked up Trail Lake Drive, and my usual route back home, stopping off, as I frequently do, at City Cyclist on the way back.

Badda boom, badda bing, thirty-six miles. Except for taking it easy on the hills, my sore back is not getting in the way of riding at all.

20090907 Labor Day

Share your bike routes @ Bikely.com

Barbeque in a Bottle

Imagine digging into a plate of Angelo's barbeque brisket and washing it down with a swig of Shiner Bock. Mmmm.... the meaty goodness of brisket and the malty snap of the beer.

But if you can't get out to a good barbeque joint, what can you do? Simple: Pick up a six-pack of Shiner Smokehaus beer. The flavor sensations will be exactly the same, even though the barbeque is missing. I guess it's kind of a novelty brew: A beer that tastes like barbeque. But... it works.

I don't know how you brew "mesquite smoked" beer, but the good folks at Spoetzl Brewery figured it out. It takes you out to a barbeque picnic even if you're hangin' out in your BarcaLounger. Add a bunch of nostalgic labeling, and this beer is a winner.

We'll Meet Again

Quick question: What's the hottest album on the British charts, coming out of nowhere to get up to Number 20? And who is the oldest singer ever to have an album on the British charts?

The answer is Vera Lynn- We'll Meet Again. Read more here. If watching this video doesn't bring a tear to your eye, you have a heart of stone.