Southside Park

John had invited me to ride Southside Park with him, Mark, and Marc on the same day that I was up at Unicoi with Billy. I couldn't ride with him, but as neither of us had ridden it before, I asked him about it afterward, and he gave it a positive report.

Alright.

Fast forward a bit... Or, actually way back, and then forward again...

I once had a Chris King/Open Pro wheelset for my road bike, broke the rim, swapped them for an old set of Ksyriums from my brother's old road bike, and eventually swapped them again for a full XTR group/wheelset that came off of his new road bike when he upgraded his stuff. So, basically I had an old King rear hub lying around with a perfectly good freehub body in it. This past Saturday, I got Glen to replace the worn-out one on my mountain bike with the good one from the old road hub. As fate would have it, he could crank the cassette nut down to his heart's content.

Score!

The Rolling Junk Show lives again.

I was eager to hit Southside Park, but I couldn't get away yesterday. Fortunately, there are two days to every weekend, and today was that second day.

Billy met me at my place around 10:00am, and we were off.

Off to the Waffle House, that is. I was starving, and there was only one cure - a chicken sandwich. Odd think to get at Waffle House, I know, but that's the way it was. Strange things were afoot at the Waffle House though. That one by my house is usually all-around-great, but today they were having trouble. There were various people waiting for to-go orders, and one couple waiting on a table. There was one table available, but it hadn't been bused. Apparently, not just anyone can bus a table at Waffle House. The greeter guy can't. The cooks can't. The servers can't. The manager can't. Just the busboy. And he wasn't around. Everybody but my got their order and left. That couple was still waiting. The busboy comes in from whatever he was doing and gets told to take care of the table. He spins around like he's headed to the dining room. Never see him again. Five minutes later I get my food and the couple is still waiting. If it'd been me, I don't think I'd have waited that long. It wasn't clear who to fault either. Everybody was working really hard. I couldn't tell what the busboy was up to. Maybe some other important thing. Defnitely atypical for them.

I had my sandwich though, and consumed it greedily on the ride down.

Southside Park is ITP. There's all kinds of good stuff ITP, if you know where to find it, and I'm learning where to find it, little-by-little.

The park itself is kind-of nondescript. Baseball fields and the like. There is this amazing sculpture though.

That's a bunch of old-aluminum bats.

The trails are pretty interesting too. There's a beginner loop - 1.5 miles, with minimal elevation and nothing technical, but man does it flow. I wanted it to be like 3 times as long, and just rip it. There's also a connector over to an intermediate trail, which abruptly crosses this weird spillway.

I'm not sure what's spilling over it. There are like 5 unnamed creeks that all come together upstream. The land is really flat there, so maybe they come together into a bit of a swamp, which generally flows north, and coalesces into a more well defined stream somewhere up there. Whatever the deal is, it's a unique feature that I've never seen before.

The intermediate trail is more of that same flow, with a little more elevation, and a bunch of rock. Like Blanket's Creek South Loop levels of rock. Not everywhere though, just here and there.

The expert trail is stacked on top of that one. A guy at the trailhead told us that it's not officially open, and there are fences up blocking it, but just ride around them because the local chapter wants people to pack it down. That sounded incredibly unlikely, but he sounded all authoritative about it, and so I felt compelled to follow his directions. Sorry Brett.

That trail is the rockiest thing I've ever ridden. And, that includes Dug Gap. Although there are more miles at Dug Gap, they are not even as densely rocky as this. I had to walk a bunch of it the first time through, but cleaned the whole trail the second time.

Shredd.

My rear tire kept getting low. I had to pump it up after the first lap, and needed to again as we were finishing the second. It was also starting to rain as we were approaching the lot. Rather than get hit with the full force of it, we decided to spin another lap around the beginner trail, chancing it with my low tire, while it was still semi-dry in the woods. This turned out to be the right move, as the rain was just starting to make it through the canopy as we finished the lap, then abruptly stopped as we pulled into the lot.

Perfect.

We didn't get in too many miles. Maybe 15 total, but I really dug the trail. There are plans to build trail at 2 more nearby parks, with greenways connecting them. If they end up anything like the trail at Southside, then it sounds like a great idea. I can't wait to string them together!

Jones Creek Ridge and Unicoi

The 6th was the first weekend of June, and though the COVIDs are still a thing, they're not such a thing that we can't work together in the NF any more.

Work party!

Sophie and I met Debbie and a bunch of other volunteers at the Bull Mountain lot, bright and early. Though, we first went to the Jake Lot, didn't find anyone, went to the Moss Creek Lot (old Game Check Station), didn't find anyone, and only then reread the email saying to meet at Bull Mountain. It's stupidity like that...

Anyway, we met everyone, got a weedeater and some loppers, and headed up to the trail above the switchbacks on Jones Creek Ridge. There was a blowdown up there years and years ago, and a lightning strike since then. Tons of light gets through, and it's a bit of a jungle in there. In the summer, it's a lot of work keeping the sight-lines clear.

It's important enough in a normal year, but this year, with the virus, the gyms are closed, everybody's getting outside, mountain bike sales have gone through the roof, and there are inexperienced riders in places you don't tend to see them, in numbers you also don't tend to see.

I took all kinds of great pictures, but for reasons I'll get into later, I don't have any of them.

While working, dozens of riders came through, including a family with young kids - both boys and girls, like 8 or 9 maybe, who totally rode that whole climb! I was super impressed.

We managed to get the whole section clear, right before I ran out of weed-eater cord. I'm bringing a stronger cord next time, or maybe a blade attachment.

We dropped off the tools, and headed up to Unicoi from there. Remember when I said it'd be great to make a habit out of camping with the Pickens'es at Unicoi? Well, I'm not sure if twice in a couple of weeks counts, but I hope it does.

Camping!

Actually, first, tubing!

There's all kinds of fun, outdoor stuff to do in and around Helen, but for as popular as it is to do, I have rarely actually gone tubing up there. I think there are 2 different tubing companies that run out of Helen, but there was some reason, which I forget now, that they couldn't use either one. And, it was just as well, it turned out. The city was as packed as Helen gets. The lines, waiting for the buses were literally a mile long. Nobody was even thinking about that 6 foot rule. The buses were running at full capacity. Traffic through town was 1-mile-per-hour, tops, and the buses went right through town. It would have taken all day. At any rate, we didn't know any of that when we decided to use our own tubes, and shuttle ourselves, but it worked out.

Billy had to take his dog to a local dog-sitter before we could get in the river, so Sophie and I waited for him at that gas station in Robertstown. While waiting, we noticed a lady ride up on a bikepacking rig, run in the store, and come out with thousands of calories in junk food. "How many miles today?" "I'm not sure... From Dillard." "TNGA route?" "Yeah! You know it?" "Oh yeah!" etc. Her name was Victoria. She was from the Brevard NC area, and said she'd been wanting to do the route since she first started riding. Man, that warmed our hearts. She was making really good time, and looked super strong. Maybe I'll see her at the start someday. We wished her good luck, and she took off toward Hogpen.

Billy arrived shortly after, and wee put in at a parking lot just inside the NF boundary on FS44, a little ways above where the tubing companies' put ins. This was a little sketchy, as they keep the river pretty clear of debris between the tubing companies' put-ins and take-outs, but it's random above and below. There was a semi-sketchy shoal up there, and a downed tree that we needed to get over/under/around. This went reasonably well. Sophie and I had $5 Walmart tubes which were literally just a big fat, inflated donut. They were quite nimble, and easy to get in and out of, but also somewhat unstable. Billy and Megan had the slightly more expensive, but infinitely fancier Walmart tubes which were bigger in diameter, with a mesh floor across the hole in the center, a seat-back, and drink coozies. They also had the kids on their laps. The larger diameter made their tubes more stable, but also much more difficult to get in and out of, especially with a kid in your lap. After a little trouble above the shoal, Megan and I ended up switching tubes, and I wrangled Hank until we got below the downed tree. Then we switched back.

After that, it was great except that our cheap tubes put us pretty low in the water. Like, my butt was at least 6 or 8 inches below the bottom of the tube, Sophie's was similarly low, and there are A LOT of rocks in the water. The ones you can see are fine. Just lift yourself up and ping-pong off of them. It's when the water starts to get shallow, but you can't immediately tell, and then there's a rock, that somehow doesn't lift the water above it, and you slam into it at 6 or 8 miles an hour. After about 10 of those, I was sick of it. You can't possibly prepare for them, you just have to take the hits. No more cheap tubes for us. Sophie also got colder than it was probably good for her to get, but pulled through. Despite all that, we had a lot of fun, it just wasn't relaxing like we'd hoped.

Again, I took great photos of all of this, but don't have them now because my phone is at the bottom of the river. I brought it with me, because last time we went tubing I'd brought it with me, and had no trouble hanging on to it and keeping it adequately safe and dry. I mean, it's in a Lifeproof case, it ought to be fine, right? Turns out no. We really got moving at one point, we through some rocks, I dropped it, it went through the hole in my tube, and that was it. We were well downstream, still moving when I realized. Going back would have been dangerous, especially with our tubes tied together, and I wasn't sure where I'd lost it, or how deep the water was.

So, no photos. I managed to get a new phone the next Monday though, and recover everything except the photos I took that day.

After tubing, we camped at the park. It went much like the last time with the kicking back by the fire, and the hot dogs, and the chicken, except that I'd bought a cheapish 4-person tent from Walmart the previous day, so me and Sophie slept in relative luxury that evening. Also, we had the presence of mind to bring some Chachere's this time, so the chicken was well seasoned.

The next morning Billy and I rode Unicoi again, and it was just as steep as the last time. After picking up and heading out, we ate at North Georgia Barbecue, which was amazing, then hung out down by the river for a while, before finally heading home.

Well, I don't know if it quite counts as a habit yet, but I'm certainly hoping that it develops into one.

Allatoona

When I was in Texas, I rode nearly every single day. Since I've been back, there's just been too much going on, and it's been difficult to get anything done, let alone ride. I guess, as a good example, it's 12:15AM right now, I've been going since 8AM, and I still have some work to do this evening.

Short on miles, but wanting to jump back in, I committed to riding with Billy at Allatoona a couple of weekends ago, feeling good about it when I did, only to find myself up 'til 4AM the night before getting some crap that I can't remember now finished. We got a decently late start, but not late enough, it would turn out.

I felt great on Rusty Bucket, but it was all downhill from there.

Well, I wish it was all downhill. In fact, there was a great deal of climbing, and I felt like garbage doing it.

I want to say we rode like 20 miles, but it felt like 60. It didn't help that my bike was giving me fits, either. Texas had really given it the business, I'd taken it to Glen for some much-needed servicing, and gotten it back in fine shape, except for one thing. The freehub body is really old, the threads have gotten worn down over the years, and there's a limit to how tight you can tighten the nut to secure the cassette. You can get it "good-and-tight" but if you get it too tight, the nut springs pops up out of the driver. It seemed fine when I started riding, but it loosened up a tad as we rode, and before long, the cassette was loose, shifting funny, and engaging like a non-King hub. It wasn't the end of the world, but it added to the misery.

I guess I shouldn't say "misery". Dissatisfaction maybe.

Ehh, some days are like that. Better sleep would help. A less rolling junkshow of a bike would help too.

Eastern Kingsnake

I was in-and-out of the basement at Kathryn's place a good bit the other day, and this cool guy made a break for it while I was inside.

He didn't make it very far into the driveway before I interrupted him by opening the door again, but then he seemed pretty ambivalent about it. Like: "Ok man, I'll just wait here. Carry on, and I'll get moving again when you're done." So, of course, I called everybody down to see him, and take photos, and video, and what have you. He just waited patiently for all that. "You guys done? Ok, thanks."

*slithers away*

Yonah Preserve and Unicoi State Park

Some number of weeks ago I made it back to Atlanta, and I think a week later, but it might have been two, Billy called me to see if me and the girls wanted to car-camp with them at Unicoi. Was that even happening? The COVIDs were still upon us, and though the state was opening up a bit, parks were still closed, and I didn't figure campgrounds would be open.

Turned out I was wrong though.

Ok. Camping!

I forget now what, but we had something to do early Saturday morning, so we did that, then ran through Publix, grabbing random stuff to cook. There were no obvious marshmallows, so Sophie asked one of the stockers, who pointed us to where we'd looked already. Sophie happened to look to her right just then, and noticed marshmallows right there. Kosher marshmallows, in the ethnic foods section. That'll do. There was a motorcycle accident just up the road, which looked horrible at first, but upon closer inspection, looked like everybody was able to walk away from. This strangled traffic though, and it took us quite a while to really get on the road.

But, we did, and actually arrived a little earlier than we expected. But, then it took forever to find the actual campsite. Apparently I'd never actually noticed the Unicoi campground, and what I thought was it was the day-use area. Woohoo.

When we found the campground itself, there were still like 87 sites that we had to sift through, and we ended up finding them by spotting Ellie Claire's golden curls from about 50 yards away!

After getting settled in, Billy and I drove over to Yonah Preserve and ripped that singletrack.

I hadn't ridden there since me and Clark inspected the partially-completed system after a massive storm had knocked down hundreds of trees. Well, let me tell you, it's a lot different now that its finished and worn in.

Glorious.

Easily one of the best "in-town" type trails around. Preston really know what he's doing. I'm kind of excited to get back and ride it again, honestly.

The lake is now open to the public as well, and there were quite a few people paddling around on it, not to mention fishing.

We spun a couple of laps, and would have spun a couple more but for the time.

Back at the camp site, we played with the kids, grilled a bunch of hot dogs and chicken, and generally kicked back.

Billy, Megan, Ellie, Hank, and Snoopy slept in a big family tent. The girls slept in Billy's spare 2-person tent. I'd brought my bikepacking gear and though I had a tarp, there was no rain in the forecast, so I ended up just sleeping under the stars. Bugs, it turned out, were not a problem, and I slept really well.

It is still early in the season though, and I need to come up with a bug solution soon. I'm not subjecting myself to the same bug-related torment I faced last year on the TNGA. I rode with my brother right after getting back to the ATL, and picked his brain a bit about the subject. He gave me some ideas. We'll see what shakes out.

The next morning we woke up, lazed around a bit, packed up, and headed to the Huddle House.

Their dining room was actually open, but we ate at a picnic table outside, under a huge Southern Magnolia, which the girls promptly climbed.

We had to be out by 11, I think, so we didn't dally around, but we still had a good time eating, and the food was excellent. I forget how good Huddle House really is. And they have actual pancakes. I'd say "Take that Waffle House!" but I live in Atlanta, and it just doesn't seem right to disparage the Waffle House.

Also, I forgot, on the way out of the campground, I noticed an example of the confusing weirdness, as the state decides just how to reopen...

The Unicoi Campground is fully open, and fully packed. Hundreds of locals packed in together. Arguably, they are adequately distant from one another. But, then there's the bathhouse... On the other hand, the Hickory Nut trail (on NF land, not state), arguably one of the least likely places you'll run into another human, on any given day, is decidedly still closed.

I don't envy the decision makers, trying to figure out how to proceed.

The park trails were open, so while everyone else went down to the river for a while, me and Billy spun a lap around Unicoi.

I couldn't remember when I'd last ridden there. It might have been 10 years ago, post TNGA, with Norma, Johnny, and Russell. It seemed like I'd been there at least once since then, but I couldn't put my finger on it.

Unicoi is kind of a figure 8. Somehow we ended up riding the bottom part of it the right way, and the top part of it the wrong way. Don't ask me how.

Man, there are some seriously steep climbs on that trail. I forgot just how steep.

Billy really doesn't like snakes, so I took a photo of this one, but shooed it away before he rode up.

I did send the photo to him later though, with heart emojis.

Dang, so much climbing...

We met the rest of the family under the bridge, at the river, where there were a dozen or so people in little groups, trying to be friendly while keeping their distance. This one guy and his granddaughter were from Hoschton, so I mentioned the local dentist, "Justin Payne, DMD", that the girls and I had noticed there years ago, and we all laughed about it. Hank and Ellie loved playing in the river, and we only left when we ran out of time.

It was a great trip. I'm glad it all worked out. Everybody seemed to have a pretty good time. It'd be a good thing to make a habit of.

The Rest of Texas

So, it looks like the new normal is going weeks, even months without journaling. How did it come to this?

Some time ago I was still in Texas.

I got a really good tan.

There's plenty of Vitamin D in Texas. There is also plenty of wind. My goodness. Leave at 4PM, heading east, dead into the wind. Ride around for 2 hours, come back heading west, somehow also dead into the wind. That's what it's like. Plenty of cookie dough in Texas as well. "Hmm... That grey dirt looks slightly soft, I wonder..." Immediately cakes both tires half an inch deep with one rotation. Immediately cakes both shoes half an inch deep with first steps. Bike weighs 8 pounds more. I don't miss the wind or the dubious grey dirt.

I had plenty of fun before I left though, riding the local trails.

There's this one up north called Sister Grove, that was honestly a lot like McKinney, and a lot like many other trails in the Dallas area.

Stacked loops.

Nice tread.

You wind around through cedars for a while, pop out into a field for a while, pop back into the cedars for a while, and repeat. Lots of cris-crossy roots to manage. Sometimes you have to lean forward awkwardly to get your center of gravity low for the turns. That's the general character of most of the local trails. Each trail has unique features though. Sister Grove, for example, borders Lavon Lake on the north side, and you can take a hunting access trail down to the edge of the lake. There's no proper shore though, the lake just floods way up into the woods. So, you're riding along, and the underbrush starts getting thin, then you see water, and it's everywhere in both directions. Really cool.

I also rode Frisco Northwest Community Park, which was the least fun I had out there. It just rattled my teeth out, and I don't usually complain about twisty trail, but it was more twisty than I enjoy. I did figure out how to ride it better on my second lap - that awkward forward-lean to keep a low center of gravity - but I didn't spin a third. As much as I didn't enjoy it, I seemed to be in the minority. The lot was full, and driving away, I saw 5 separate riders on their way to the park from various local neighborhoods.

Other than that, I put in a ton of miles on dirt roads south of Forney, near Crandall and Talty. "The Blackland". One road, FM2757, was nearly 4 miles of packed limestone and gravel one day, and then two days later it was paved. I guess I happened to catch it at just the right time.

I got in a lot of good miles in Texas, but there were things to do back in Atlanta, so I ended up heading back before getting to hit a few of the trails that I'd hoped to. That's how it goes sometimes, but I imagine I'll be back soon enough. My folks live there, and I doubt that'll be changing any time soon.

Texas

I've been in Texas for a day shy of 4 weeks now. Long story, but it looks like I may be here for a little while longer too.

I have been riding a lot though. Like every-day-a-lot. I've also been as slammed as a person can be with work, which may seem unlikely, considering the pandemic we're in the middle of, but is, in fact, the case. This has left little time for journaling, and I don't really have a lot of time now, but maybe I can spend a few minutes, and capture some semblance of the experience, for future reflection.

Let's see...

I'm staying with my folks. My Dad broke his arm a while back, but while healing, bought a new Blur. He's been dying to ride it, and was well healed when I arrived, but it's been raining in Dallas, and when it rains in Dallas, all this black clay:

...becomes black cookie dough. All trails are closed, and it's pretty well hopeless for the average mountain biker.

But!

Being off to one side of the average mountain biker, I had a plan. There's still a ton of paved trail in and around Dallas. I've never ridden any of it, and my Dad was so antsy to get on a bike that he jumped at the chance to ride on it as well. As such, we did a couple of really long rides, right out of their house.

Some highlights:

There's a MiG-17 in Forney, Texas. For some reason. Just sitting there.

Bluebonnets are everywhere this month. Everywhere you look.

One ride was so long that we stopped at Sonic for lunch.

On that same ride, we crossed Lake Ray Hubbard.

I noticed a bunch of what looked like gravel roads at Samuell Farm, and called the Dallas Parks Dept. to see if the park was open to bikes. Turns out yes, so I spun a couple of laps out there to explore the place...

It turns out that most of the trails out there are fire-roadish and hold up well to rain. A good option if it's been wet.

There's also an old rail spur that once led from the main line south of Hwy 80 up to the power plant on Lake Ray Hubbard. Turns out a good bit of it is rideable, but I managed to walk into a piece of barbed wire, stepping around the end of a fence, exploring one section of it, and had to do a little eyebrow repair.

I eventually took my Dad out for another long ride where we hit a bunch of stuff that I'd discovered during the previous week, including a lap around Samuell Farm.

We ended up having to outrun a storm, then shelter under the porch of the old park office while it blew over.

But it blew over quickly, and it was dry before we even got home.

Later that week, it had been dry long enough for Rowlett Park to be open. I hadn't ridden there in years, but it's my Dad's favorite place to ride, so we didn't miss the opportunity. We had a great time on the south side trails, and a decent time on the north side trails, until we hit "14", where my Dad had the hardest crash I've ever seen. The trail dives back and forth across various ravines. The first sketchy drop was missing a big chunk of concrete that had been used to armor it, and a bunch of dirt had been eaten out all the way around the armor. We made that one. On the second sketchy drop, 8 inches or more of dirt had gotten washed out, leaving a mat of roots suspended over the old line. You had to go left or right. Right was wide and good. Left was super narrow and still had roots at the bottom that you'd have to get over. He went left, for some reason... where his new bars are just way too wide to fit. He caught a tree, got his bars spun, went flying, and hit the ground head first from like 4 feet up. No time to get his hands down. It didn't look survivable. I was sure I'd just watched my Dad die. But, then he got up, seemingly uninjured. Everything worked. His face was scraped up, but he hadn't broken anything. His right shoulder was stoved, but even that felt ok a few minutes later. He didn't have any signs of a concussion. It couldn't believe it.

There are like 6 or 8 more drops that you have to get through to get out. We rode the next one, and I could immediately see what was happening. He was accelerating into these drops as if he knew what they're going to be like. In theory, he does know every drop out there, but in practice, he hadn't ridden any of them in over a year. The rain had been particularly hard this past winter too, and some of the drops were very different than he remembered. He'd get committed before he knew what he was committing to, and then have to adjust. This had not traditionally been a problem, but it had become one. That was one issue. To make that issue just that much worse, he'd never ridden that bike on singletrack, and it turned out to be wildly unstable. He looked like he was WAY too far forward. I could see him do stuff to try to control it and the bike just wasn't doing what you'd expected it to do.

We walked the remaining drops and spun another lap around the south side, which was totally fine, but I was honestly just antsy to get done and feel safe again.

It turned out later that he'd destroyed his helmet and beat his right shoulder up pretty good, somehow. I don't understand how though, because he landed on his head and left shoulder. Maybe his right hand was still holding onto the bars real hard when they got spun and it straightened that arm violently? His neck was stiff for a few days, but the only lingering problems are with his right shoulder. So weird.

At any rate, he's now off the bike again. I told him, this is how I quit skateboarding. I'd get injured and spend more time healing than I spent before getting injured again. At a point I had to hang it up. He needs to go a very long time with no crashes, and in the mean time, stay off of 14.

We did all kinds of measurements on his bike setup too. Indeed, between the longer wheelbase, and much wider bars, standing, he was almost 4 inches further forward of the center of his pedals than on his old bike, and the wheelbase is only 1 inch longer. Seated, he was 3.5 inches further forward. He cut the bars down a bit and moved the seat back. Seated, he's only an inch forward of where he was. Standing, he's still 2 inches though. The center of gravity seems to be about an inch further back though, so maybe, with the new geometry, it's enough. Another issue was that he only had about 60% of the air that he needed in his fork, so that was just diving on him every time he'd hit the bottom of anything. He only had about 75% of what he needed in the shock too. After all that fiddling, it felt way more stable to him, just spinning around. We'll have to see how it goes on the trail.

I was now short a riding buddy, but there was still plenty to do. Over the next few days, I scoured the general Forney area for anything marginally fun to ride, and managed to find a bit of it. I also hit some singletrack at Squabble Creek and some paved trails around a lake next door.

There were ducks.

And they were cute.

The next weekend, I rode Boulder Park and Oak Cliff. It looks like most of Dallas proper sits on a thin layer of oily black clay, which, in turn, sits on limestone. The creek that runs through Boulder Park carves deep into a limestone bed. There was exposed limestone everywhere at Oak Cliff. It turns every little kick into stair-steps when it deteriorates.

At Boulder, there's this weird trail called 1+1=1, which bombs down below a dam, then makes you climb right back up Porter Hill.

Oh, man, tell me that's named after Ray Porter. I really hope it is.

At Oak Cliff, someone had, somehow, gotten a hoarded out Ford Ranger well into the system before finally getting it jammed hard in between some trees.

I'm going to bet that alchohol was involved in the decision to do that.

The trail is mostly really easy, except where it's punctuated by steep, extremely technical, and arguably dangerous descents. There are a bunch of jumps out there too.

Good times.

Over the next few days, I figured: "It's Texas. There must be dirt roads here somewhere." and proceeded to search for said roads in what looked like more vacant regions of the map south of Forney.

I hit paydirt, as they say:

...and spent the next week exploring all of that. Somewhere in there, I stepped into some grass and got bitten by some horrible ants that left dime-sized welts on my leg, the centers of which died and peeled off. I saw the ants, and brushed them off, so I know it was ants. Some weird Texas ants though.

This past Saturday I shredded some singletrack at Harry S. Moss park, followed by a long grinder all the way up and down the White Rock Creek Trail, and a long spin around the White Rock Lake Trail. My goodness, the wind. The trails on the west side of the lake were modern and smooth. On the east side, they were super old and rough.

I did run into this long slithery guy out there near the lake.

There was some kind of water snake below the spillway too, slowly swimming against the current, but it went under as soon as I tried to get my phone out.

Well... that's the spillway at least. The "waterfall" section of it.

Today I rode Windmill Hill, which was quite the spiderweb. It's definitely more of an enjoy-the-woods kind of place, as opposed to an enjoy-the-trails kind of place. I felt like I missed out on a good hike by bringing my bike. Much like Oak Cliff too, it was super easy, except where it was all of a sudden treacherously technical and steep. There were 2 climbs that I tried 3 times each, and, between the roots and rocks, just was never able to make.

There were a bunch of families out there today. Lots of parents with kids, babies even. It really made me smile.

Windmill was fun, but it was only 4 or 5 miles, and the day was young enough to check out Goat Island Preserve, which was about 20 minutes away, right down the same street that Windmill was on. Goat Island was also more of an experience-the-woods than experience-the-trails kind of place. The trails out there just run on, with long sight lines, kind of a welcome relief from the small intestine twistiness that you see in the in-town trails here.

It is rather bumpy though, and the grass encroaches.

There are a few spots along the Trinity River where you can see super-creatively-named "Lock and Dam #2".

Which looks pretty impressive, but is apparently way more impressive when the water level is lower.

There are various overlooks out there, and each is tagged with this cute sign.

When I first read it, it didn't strike me as meaning that hazards may exist in this specific location, rather that it was just reminding me that hazards might exist, you know, in general... maybe. They MAY exist.

Goat Island proper is just a chunk of land that's separated from the mainland by a cut-off of the river itself. The cut-off is only full after significant rain, and today it was just a series of pools that had drained down until they wouldn't drain any more. The trail crosses it over a concrete-armored spillway. Some folks were fishing from the spillway when I rode by. I talked to them for a few minutes, and during those few minutes we both watched gar after gar surface in the pool. They weren't huge, considering how big gar can get, but any one of them would have been the biggest fish I'd ever caught.

So it's been. So it will likely be for at least a few more days. Maybe even a few more weeks. I've got things to do back in Atlanta, and I'd like to have been back already. I guess we'll see what tomorrow brings.