Friday, March 31, 2006

Finally stopped being a loser

and rode the ole' bike to work. Didn't ride at all to work last week. Doing an office move and had be able to run things to and fro. Didn't work monday and parts of town got up to 3.5 inches of rain tues. Wednesday there were still scattered thunderstorms and well thursday, they were calling for rain and i was feeling lazy. excuses are like ass holes, everyones got 'em.

rode today and had to do one of the CPO style glamour shots.



think its time to get some new bar tape? funny thing, the blue side is recycled off of tara's mustache bars.



and you think riding in city traffic is scary. how about riding on an interstate frontage road with cars traveling at 60mph+. you gotta love the shoulder.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

Bachelor Boot




Welp, a few good buddies came down to Austin this weekend. An old roommate from Cali who is now a high powered lawyer in NYC, a climbing buddy who lives in Santa Monica, and my roommate from undergrad who stores his truck in Seattle, but is usually down in Patagonia, up in Alaska, or over in the Himalaya guiding rich folks up big mountains. He's got a website if any of you are thinking about the big mountains:



Went to Enchanted rock to do some climbing. Well we didn't do too much climbing since none of us have been spending too much time on the rock lately, but it was real good to get some time to hang out and eat lots of bacon. 2.5 lbs. in 2 days between 4 people. Is that a lot?

The last night we cleared out of the E-rock and headed to Perdenales State Park. Even though the park was full we scored a camp site.

The Petron was so good for a while. Must have been that first shot I took, it was probably a triple shot or a mouthful. That stuff is so good. Getting pulled up of my crash pad and shaken didn't help too much either. Oh well. Those are the remnants of Texas Chili Cheese fries!

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Fuckin Sweetness

Finally did it. Managed to wake up early enough and throw the leg over the bike and ride to work. Mostly the delay was I'd never really explored the back roads between my house and office. Kinda hard to do when you just want to get home or to work as fast as possible. Finally saw one non-highway road up towards work the other weekend when I had to come back down south by ways other than the highway and came down Metric. Had the bed of the truck loaded with river gravel and anything over 50 felt real sketchy cause the front tires were unwieghted. Then the road my buddy rEy and I took to Walnut Creek was super sweet with a bike lane ran into Metric.

Sweet ride. Cool enough for knee and arm warmers. Super mellow, bike lane almost the entire way. Little crushed stone greenbelt trail action through Wells Branch. Finally a country road without a shoulder, but no traffic to an office park. Then came the sketchy part. Last probably 1/2 mile was all I-35 frontage road. Goddamn. A bit scary and some goddamn Dell employee came within about 4 inches of my leg. Fucker. These Dell people piss me off. Mostly cause their campus is so big it creates most of the traffic. They also seem like pretty idoitic and uncourteous driver, ya' know the type, the ones that are in a turning lane and pull up to block your left hand turn even though they got a red light. Oh sorry, didn't see you there I was on my cell phone, putting on lipstick, reading the paper.... Guess odds are if you employ a few thousand people odds are your going to get few jackasses.

Well, took about an hour with some stopping to look at the map along the way. Its about 13 miles by highway so its about that by the back streets. We'll see if I can manage 3 days a week. 2 hours everyday might make me neglect the home duties too much. Also see if work can manage a sweaty biker in their midst. No shower, but there is always the sponge bath in the office bathroom!

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

link working

okay, the rocky hill ranch link is working. put the whole http:// thing in dere twice. oops. its a pretty cool website though. after riding there I felt pretty grateful to the people who opened up their land and made such kick ass trails.

Monday, March 13, 2006

god dangit

tried to put a link up on the sidebar. kept coming up to microsoft. but if you like show tunes you should turn up the volume and paste this up top:

www.boomersrockyhill.com

Rocky Hill Ranch



After a late Saturday night headed to Rocky Hill Ranch to do some riding. Private ranch in Smithville that allows biking, camping, and has a great saloon. Good climbing to get in and out of the trails. Super fun single track in the lost pines. In and out of dry washes that probably only have water during a big rain. As you can see the camera didn't come out much. Once at some coolers they had set out on the trail before heading back into the pines and once at the end of the ride, packing up. Had a couple of beers, a huge burger, a couple of bites of a way too hot halapeno, and fries. Pretty good for a lazy Sunday.

Project Free Weekend





Pretty awesome weekend here. Feels like summer to me, but I guess this is still considered early spring. 80's and 90's with humidity is early spring I guess.

Tara's up in Arkansas with her friend Yvette. Schools on spring break and it was a little break from resposibilities for me. Lots of guilt free riding. Started with a short 3-5 miler with the mutts and my buddy Hector up at Walnut Creek. It was already hot and humid and Carmen was dragging so Hector rode on and I rode back to the car with the mutts. A couple of stops at some water holes got Carmen refreshed and ready to carry on. Only twice did she run off to a creek to go fishing. This dog is fascinated by the small fish that occupy these creeks. She can spend hours, oblivious to everything, trying to catch these fish. Bit easier getting her back that day. Maybe it was allowing for longer stops so she could get her fix. Rango on the other hand is always on the back wheel ready for when you try and put the hammer down.

Back home by noon. Cooking and then eating pancakes with my buddy rEy. Took out an Austin map and figured out a way to ride up to Walnut. Sweet ride. Better than I thought. The roads get pretty sketchy up north, but I knew there had to be a chill way. Bike lanes pretty much the whole way after we crossed 183. The sketchiest frontage road in Austin. Almost hit once by a guy pulling into a parking lot. Parkfield though brings you through some neighborhoods lined with live oaks and small hills through the drainages.

Dropped us into the loops at the southeast end. Did a few laps out on the back. Finally used my camera effectively. Saw a little side trail at a powerline that we were pointed at and decided to ride it. Its a trail that I don't really ride to often and couldn't remember it. Dropped us down this steep chute in the trees.

Rode on to the burm and the camera came out again. Usually when I ride I don't like stopping to set up pictures, but for some reason it felt like the thing to do. Maybe had to do with riding to the trail.

Used to be afraid to go high on the fixxie, always afraid I ride off the top into the woods, but its super fun on a freewheel. Coming down feels pretty steep when your on top of it.

Rey had a little trouble with the timing of the camera. He's a photographer, too.


By the end of that ride, that jersey was toast. Caught my inside pocket on a piece of tree branch going around a turn. Ripped open the pockets and one side to just under my armpit. All my tools flew out halfway down a cliff into the creek. Sweet. Thanks for the jersey, Carp. It was sweet while it lasted.