The Land of a Thousand Commutes

That's what Texas feels like this time of year. This morning was chilly, foggy and damp. I started out before sunrise and rode in. Here are a few scenes from my commute. Below: My new headlight that puts out 255 lumens is a big improvement over my old one.



I used to think cutting across a parking lot was a point of shame, but I've decided that certain parking lots do afford the best route for a cyclist. If I didn't turn into this parking lot I'd have to make a left turn at a major intersection. My bike won't trip the signal, and it might be three or four turns of a light before a car turns left at that spot.



Pea soup!





My commuter... This weekend I went from the Origin8 Space Bar I've run for several months back to the original flat bar, plus I added some bar ends, just to change things up a bit.





The ride home was a totally different story. The sun burned off the fog early and was still shining a bit when I left for home. But this being fall, it didn't hang around long.







Riding into the sunset.





I think I'll wait for the green light, thanks...







In fifteen minutes it went from the twilight above to the total darkness below. Talk about night falling!



I made it home, safe and sound. The new headlight is a Cygolite Rover II LED with 25 Watts and 255 lumens. It's a big improvement. Now for the back I'd like to get one more PlanetBike Superflash so I can leave one on steady and put the other in blink mode.

The Paris Coffee Shop

I get every other Friday off, and on the Fridays when I don't have other plans, I like to explore Fort Worth from the saddle of a bicycle. Sometimes I do a breakfast ride to somewhere I haven't been before. I searched through Fort Worth Hole in the Wall and noticed the entry for the Paris Coffee Shop at Magnolia and Hemphill. I thought, you know, I've never been there before! And off I went.

Part of the reason I like these rides is a chance to see Fort Worth up close and personal, from the quirky to the classic. For instance, Friday the 13th was apparently Miss Gonzalez's 40th birthday. I don't know Miss Gonzalez, but those who love her announced her birthday to the Colonial Country Club neighborhood.





Going a little further east, just past the zoo, is a cool building that houses the Forest Park Apartments in background with a little "gatehouse" in the foreground. There is a gatehouse on either side of Park Place Avenue on the west side of Forest Park Boulevard.



A short ride beyond that and my trusty Schwinn Varsity got me to the Paris Coffee Shop.



Fort Worth Hole in the Wall describes the shop thus: "Paris Coffee Shop has great food, a cool location, and a dingy cluttered interior that seems about right." This is an apt description. There is no pretense in this place. Just stuff to cook and serve food, and friendly people to do it. They don't have an ambiance, unless you count the pictures of famous people on the west wall.



What they have is good, basic food. I was in a waffle mood. The food got to me incredibly quickly.



My coffee cup was always full, and the price was right.



I can see how the place stays open... very good stuff.

But my ride is about more than breakfast. Like I said, I like to explore. A few blocks down Magnolia, there was some work going on at the old Gunn's Cleaners. I've admired this building for a while and hoped something good would go in there.



The guy on the left side of the picture explained to me that a brew pub will soon be in the building. It needed extensive renovation to repair the roof which was heavily damaged by a fire some years ago. The worker I talked to was restoring the windows on either side of the front door. He said that eventually the windows along the east wall,



will be replaced by similarly constructed windows (the originals were knocked out while fighting the fire). They were just getting ready to pour the new concrete floor the morning I was there.



You can see the new roof in this shot; I suspect the rafters will remain visible when the pub opens.



Cutting through the bike-friendly Fairmount neighborhood on my way home, I noticed the Arts Fifth Avenue building.



According to the sign, it should have been open when I was there, but it didn't seem like anyone was around. I hope they're still going. Their website seems to indicate they are.





This next picture looks kind of scenic, but I took it to show the construction zone on the riverfront Trinity River Trail. Normally a multi-use path (MUP) allows people to cross University Drive under the road bridge along the river. That path is currently closed while they reconstruct it to improve sight lines to make it safer.



The construction zone starts at the right side of the picture and goes all the way up to the University Drive bridge on the left side, and beyond, all the way to Rogers Road.

I'll end this post with a few pictures of my 1973 Schwinn Varsity.

A Trip To West Texas

This past weekend, we went to Lubbock to attend the wedding of a friend of the family. The groom is a longtime friend of my oldest son, who was one of the ushers at the wedding. In this pic you can see the back of Mrs. Doohickie in the blue dress, and my son in the center of the pic.



The wedding and reception were held at the Cap Rock Winery just south of Lubbock. Quite a nice place. And the wine was very good.

By the time the wedding got started it was getting dark out, so the only picture that my cell phone took that was worth a darn happened to be taken at the same moment someone else's flash went off.



The wedding itself was just charming- low key and high class. It featured a processional of Pachelbel's Canon played on guitar, a duet performance of The Prayer by the groom's brother and sister, and for the recessional, they played Queen's You're My Best Friend (a song that predates the bride and groom's births). Very personal and classy, I thought.

Okay, so that was the "official" trip. This was also our first trip to Lubbock. My wife sent me on a mission to find a Texas Tech pennant for her classroom (she puts up pennants to encourage her students to think about attending college). I drove up to the Texas Tech campus and found the pennant at the Varsity Book Store across from the campus.

There were also several other college-town type businesses, so we went back there for lunch. After looking around, we settled on Freebird World Burrito (which was kind of dumb, because we can get that here in Fort Worth). After lunch we got ice cream at The Arrogant Texan, an ice cream and sweets store a couple blocks down. I saw a first there:





Shine Bock flavored ice cream! (For those who don't know, Shiner Bock is a Texas beer.)

A few other tidbits from the trip- First, here is the view out our hotel window:



Trust me, the block wall was an improvement; we were next to a used tire store. ;- ) On the trip we passed Sweetwater, Texas. Sweetwater is the center of the Western Hemisphere's leading wind power generation region, at least according to Wikipedia.





These pictures don't even begin to capture the extent of this wind farm. You drive for several miles and see lots and lots and lots of wind turbines, all spinning to generate electricity. There are thousands of them. To get an idea of what you're looking at, each blade is longer than a semi trailer (I know this because they are a common site passing through Fort Worth). And the turbine at the top of each pole is about the size of a minivan. These things are massive. And like I said, they go on for miles.

Anyway, those are the highlights of our little trip. I hope you enjoyed them.

Trinity Trail Closed in Fort Worth

For those of you who ride the Trinity River Trail near University Drive in Fort Worth, be aware that the construction zone in that area has been enlarged and is no longer possible to use the trail to cross University Drive.

A friend of mine offered this alternative, which cuts through the University Village shopping center.

Trinity Trail at University Detour

Share your bike routes @ Bikely.com

This detour goes around the closed section with a minimum of exposure to heavy car traffic. If heading toward downtown, exit the trail on Rogers, proceed north, then turn right on Collinsworth, a left on Wabash, and go into the shopping center. Turn right on the shopping center road that leads to the traffic light at University and Old University. Cross University at the light and follow Old University to the little traffic circle at its end, where there is access to get back onto the Trinity Trail.

This work was discussed on Fortworthology in September. At the the time I got the impression it would affect more of the trail than it has to date, with the trail closed between Rogers and University.

A Notable Commute

I figured I would take a nice leisurely evening ride home that included a few miles on the Trinity River Trail. We've had a wet fall, but no rain for the last week or two. Where I get on the trail I have to go over one of the low water crossings. Would it be clear? Well, it was dry... kind of. A little muddy. But there was a lot of debris on the crossing. You know, little twigs and stuff.... like this:





I was determined though so I cyclocrossed the low-water crossing and went up the other side. I got to the other low-water crossing where I usually cross back and waddya know? This one was still flooded.



So now I had to ride a few more miles down the trail and get off at a point where I can take a road bridge across. I settled in for the longer ride and started pushing the pedals. I noticed a headlight behind me on the trail that was getting closer and closer. The guy finally caught up to me and it turned out to be a good friend of mine. We've known each other for years, but never rode together. I found out why.... this guy can really hammer away. Still, he preferred to ride with a partner and had pity on me and allowed me to hang around. I hadn't ridden in almost a week, had a leisurely ride into work (read: I had no energy) and this afternoon wasn't much better. I didn't want to hold him up too much, so I pushed harder than I really wanted to.

We did probably about 10 miles together before splitting up about a block from his house. I rode the mile or so to my house and nearly collapsed from exhaustion. It was a great ride. :)

Hardcore?

People are starting to tie that word to me and my bicycle commuting. Yesterday, for instance, I rode into the teeth of 30 mph gusting winds on a day that saw 4 inches of rain locally.

I can see where they're coming from, but I don't really see it that way. There are times when I rarely commute. The two weeks prior to this week, I only rode to work one day. We have a leak in the roof and I had to be available to come home quickly if an insurance adjuster or roofing guy came by. So.... I had to drive.

This week started with beautiful weather. With a more favorable schedule I decided to try to ride to work all five days. Monday and Tuesday were great: mid-50s in the morning, mid-70s in the afternoon. No problem.

Wednesday was a different matter. Significant rainfall was predicted. It was iffy. I checked outside and it was wet but it wasn't raining. I got ready to ride, packed up the bike and set out, only to find a steady rain that increased as I rode. On days like that, I tell my wife, "Well, as long as I can get to work okay, if I have to, I catch a ride home with someone." Her reply is usually a sardonic, "Yeah. Right." She knows that if I ride to work, I ride home. So far I haven't let bad weather stop me.

When I got to work, I was soaked head-to-toe like someone had sprayed me with the garden hose. Despite the wind and rain I wasn't too cold; the temp was in the 60s. It was a pretty wild ride, the worst weather in which I'd ridden to work. At the end of the day, my nylon jacket was dry, but the long sleeve t-shirt I'd worn was soaked, so I just rode home in my work shirt. The ride home was a repeat of the ride in, except it was raining hard the whole way, the wind was now in my face, and because it had rained all day there was a lot of street flooding, up to the frame of the bike.

This morning I was better prepared. The radar showed the rain was still around, a check outside confirmed it. I dressed similarly to the previous day, except that I put a hat on under my helmet and added a vinyl raincoat under my hi-visibility windbreaker. It was about ten degrees cooler, but when I started out... no rain! So I was over-dressed and a little too warm. I hit some rain just as I got close to work, though, so the vinyl layer paid off.

This afternoon was a piece of cake. Not only had it warmed into the 70s, but the wind was at my back for a change.

Tomorrow I plan to ride, which will make this the first week in quite a while that I've commuted all five days in a work week.

So... why was I so hardcore this week? Well first of all, I had challenged myself to ride all five days for a change. My work schedule usually prevents this because of meetings I have away from my office on Wednesdays, but I didn't have any meetings this week (I was in a training class). So there was that.

When the rains rolled in it would have been easy to back out of riding, but there is something else that kicks in when conditions get bad. If I'm up to it, I like to push the envelope of conditions in which I'll ride. I won't say I would always ride in conditions like that, but it makes life interesting to challenge myself occasionally. There is the rush of meeting the challenge, when the ride is almost an adventure. I wouldn't want to do it all the time, but I like to push the limits once in a while.

And yeah, there's this: I love the look of disbelief when people in the office find out I've ridden to work through terrible weather. It doesn't bother me one bit if they think I'm just a little crazy.

Ultimately though, what it comes down to is I'm not hardcore. I'm a fool.

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