The other day I drove down after work to the Forest Lane DART station, parked my car, and went for a bike ride on the White Rock Creek trail. I didn’t feel very good and wondered why – later I found out the temperature was 108 F (42 C). That was the problem – even though I had plenty of cold water – that sort of heat will suck the energy out of me.
As the sun set I stopped to catch my breath near where my car was. I watched the DART trains cross the old railroad bridge near the Urban Reserve development. Some of the cool people that live there were out walking their dogs and we chatted while I snapped some shots of the bridge and the sun. I thought of the hundreds of times I’ve ridden that train and looked out the window over the trail.
I braved the heat today and went on a bike ride up at the Oak Point Park and Nature Preserve in Plano – riding down to Bob Woodruff park and out west along Plano’s Santa Fe trail (every city here has one of these). It’s a fun little route I rode last year and it’s a vaired one – some wooded creek bottoms, some open prairie, and a couple of nice hills.
About halfway out the Santa Fe trail branch of my route, along Oak Grove road, I had noticed a sign that said, “Santa Fe Park and Bowman Cemetery.” Looking up the hill I saw an open stretch of grass with some old monuments peeking over the crest. On the way back, I pumped up an alley and found the old cemetery – took a break to look at the stones and snap a few pictures.
The cemetery is in the middle of a neat, modest suburban neighborhood. Somehow, it fits there.
Someone is still putting flowers out on some of the graves – a century later.
Not all the markers are grand monuments. Some, like these were no bigger than a small paperback book.
The cemetery sits right in the middle of a middle class suburb, but you can picture it on a knob of a hill with wilderness all around without much trouble. There is a historical marker – but the plastic is faded and crazed and I couldn’t read it.
From a historical website (they seemed to have trouble reading it too – thus the ellipses):
John D. Bowman established Bowman Cemetery with the burial of his daughter, Julia Ann Bowman Russell, who died on September 5 1858. The cemetery contains two fenced family lots. The large, more elaborate lot with wrought iron fencing, contains the burial of several members of John D. Bowman family, and their immediate in-laws. Among these are Joseph Russell, a Peters Colony (Republic of Texas land grant given to investors led by William S. Peters) settler, and Dr. Henry Dye, an early…..physician. The smaller, wire-fenced lot contains members of the Brown family, who were related to the Bowman and Russell families through marriage. Several marked and unmarked burials of both early African Americans and European American residents of Plano surround these fenced lots. A variety of gravestone types are represented in Bowman Cemetery. These range from the prominent marble tablet stones and a few….modern granite markers. Many of these stones are adorned with symbols and fancy….such as fraternal organizations….and religious or philosophical beliefs typical of the time period. The most recent marked burial in the cemetery is for John D. Bowman’s son, George W. Bowman, who died in June of 1921.
Whenever I see an old cemetery like this I can’t help but be reminded of how many folks died young. Half the graves are of children, half of the rest are less than thirty years old. When you find yourself down and worrying about the latest “crises” or feel the world is going to hell in a handbasket, think of these pioneers and how tough their life used to be.
Here’s a cool trailer for a documentary about a bunch of elite skilled mountain bikers in the most amazing isolated places you have ever seen. It’s not about me.
But I don’t live along the Danube, in Paris or in Napa Valley. I live in Dallas, Texas. I ride through horrible baking heat underneath high tension wires.
As the cities of North Texas struggle to backfill their infrastructure with transit options they have to do what they can with what they’ve got. One thing that has proved useful are abandoned rail lines – made in into rail transit corridors or rails-to-trails conversions. Another, less glamorous lemonade-from-lemons option is the open space beneath the high tension power lines.
These lines contain rare and precious undeveloped land underneath their buzzing clusters of wires strung between tower steel transmission towers. Because of the enormous voltage carried on these lines, there can be nothing underneath – no houses, trees, or even scrub – only bare grass with an occasional road sneaking across. In theory this makes a perfect path for a new bicycle trail – all you have to do is pour a wide sidewalk snaking back and fourth along the right of way.
The only problem is that it is aesthetically awful. Bare grass, towering gantries of metal, and buzzing wires bursting with voltage… and nothing else. No beautiful meandering rivers, bustling city centers, or impressive distant views – only the wavy mirage of heat waves rising from bare concrete baking in the Texas sun.
What it does offer is mileage. These trails can go on for a long way, crossing huge swaths of dense city. Riding one of these trails gives the illusion of isolation – you forget you are in a hornet’s nest of millions of people – because you barely see anyone other than another rider every now and then. Even the suburban developments that line the right of way have high wooden privacy fences and appear from the trail as a long, ragged, wood stockade.
I rode a long way, though I didn’t exhaust the possible mileage in the long intersecting Plano trail system. Maybe another day… maybe when it isn’t as hot. Don’t think I’ll miss anything in the meantime.
The trail winds beneath the giant towers
When you fall into the illusion that you are isolated in the middle of a bustling city, you come across an oasis of civilization – a busy cross street, a Whataburger, a Taco Delite
A rare and welcome amenity is a shady bench where I can sip some water and read a bit on my Kindle – I carry that in my handlebar bag.
I had to take Nick to the airport and took a look at Google Maps for a bicycle trail in the area. I only recently learned of the “Bicycle” option on the maps – where any bike routes or trails show up as bright green lines. It makes it easy to spot good places to ride.
I was attracted to a long stretch of green along the eastern border of Irving. Looking closely I saw that it was the Campion Trail. The city wants to eventually hook it all up together into a twenty-mile long system, but for now the north and south sections are unconnected. The northern arm looked to be the longest – running from Las Colinas up past Interstate 635 into Valley Ranch – so I picked a parking area along Riverside Drive – Bird’s Fort Trail Park, and drove there after dropping Nick off.
It had been raining all afternoon, but as I pulled into the parking lot, it tapered to a stop and the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. I put everything together and began to ride. My idea was to go south and visit the two miles or so of trail that went that-a-way, and if the weather held and I felt good I’d then cross back past my car and explore to the north.
The Campion trail is really, really nice. It’s almost brand spankin’ new – miles of smooth, wide concrete with few road crosses and it’s flat as a pancake. I had it almost to myself as I started but as it became obvious that the rain had finished more riders, runners, and families on an evening stroll came out to enjoy the trail and the string of parks it connects.
The only difficulty was water over the trail underneath Northwest Highway. As I approached I saw bicycle tracks in the silt under the water so I forged on in, thinking it was only a few inches deep. It turned out to be about two feet – so I got plenty wet – but was able to force the mountain bike on through without much trouble.
I ended up riding almost the whole trail out and back – skipping only the very last part that winds through the urban areas of Valley Ranch. It was a really nice ride – easy, with a varied landscape. A lot of the trail is through the heavily wooded Trinity River Bottoms, and the various canals, lakes, and ponds of the Las Colinas Area, but there is also some really nice residential areas along the way and the giant concrete mountains of the Interstate 635 and President George Bush Turnpike interchanges.
I rode until the sun started setting. I thought I’d gone about ten miles or so, but my gmap pedometer route shows a tad over twelve.
I’d like to go back, but it sure is a long drive from where I live. There are some side trails and routes I’d like to check out. I’d like to try the South Section of the Campion Trail too. Maybe some day.
You have to keep an eye out for the tasteful and subtle trail markers for the Campion Trail or you will miss them. They are obviously designed to be unobtrusive and to blend into the natural setting.
All along the trail are little paved side trails leading to “River Viewing” areas. There are comfortable benches where you can sit and enjoy the crystal waters of the Trinity River as it roils and burbles down its rocky bed on the way to the sea. As you watch every now and then a Styrofoam cup will float by for your entertainment. If you are lucky, you might get to spot a murder victim’s body.
Especially after a rain, friendly woodland creatures emerge from the thick river bottom woods to greet you along the concrete trail.
The natural landscape is enhanced by the sight of the massive flyovers from the interchange of Interstate Highway 635 and the President George Bush Toll Road.
Last weekend, it was hot, very hot. As it does every year, summer is slamming its toxic wall of incalescence into the population like Castle Bravo into Bikini. I had a ten mile bicycle ride planned out – from the DART station at Araphaho north along the Central Trail and looping through the Spring Creek Natural Area – including the new little extension that runs up under the towering vertiginous George Bush Turnpike interchange… then back. Ten miles isn’t very far, but my bike is heavy and inefficient and its motor is old and worn out – so it was enough, especially in this heat.
(click to enlarge)
My good intentions were to get up at dawn and go in the relative cool of the dewy morning – good intentions… but we know where the road that is paved with those leads to. I did not actually get on the road until the sun was directly overhead. It wasn’t too bad, though – I carried plenty of iced water and the Spring Creek part of the trail is shaded by the thick forest. I took my Kindle and stopped a few times to read a short story at any particularly tempting shaded bench I came across.
The looping trails through the Spring Creek Natural Area converge on a little footbridge over the creek. There is a nice bench there – a good place to rest and get away from the city for a few minutes.
The only problem I had was that the bolts on my bicycle rack worked themselves loose while I was riding. I noticed one side coming off and stopped to fix what I could – and then later the other came loose. I was able to keep going after some repairs, but the rack was useless.
Bike Nashbar rack mounted on the back of my bicycle.
When I arrived at home I was able to scrounge up replacements for the bolts that I lost and reassembled everything. But I knew this would happen again. No matter how hard I torque down those little aluminum bolts the constant shaking and jarring of my halting progress across uneven concrete would make them back their way out of their proper, tight position. So I sat down facing the search engines and decided to learn what I could do to stop this from reoccurring.
I entered the world of the threadlocker. There are many brands and many types… but it didn’t take long to limit everything down to one key identifier and two types – Red and Blue.
Both colors will keep your bolts under your thumb, but the red, the high strength, has to be heated to five hundred degrees to give up its grip. The blue, however, is removable with “ordinary hand tools.” So blue it was.
A trip to an automotive parts store and a tiny tube of blue threadlocker was at hand. I took the rack off, and carefully reinstalled it, squirting a little blue stuff onto each bolt as I threaded it back home.
So now, is it possible that that rack will go flying off into oblivion when I am tooling along in the middle of nowhere sometime casting my absolutely necessary survival gear into some bottomless pit? Maybe.
But I’ve done what I can.
This works, but it looks stupid. Though not as stupid as when I’m actually riding the thing.
I didn’t feel like it (I was exhausted and my head was pounding) but I went for a little bike ride after work. My bike was in the back of the car so I drove down to the nearby Forest Lane train station – one that the Cottonwood Trail runs by. I changed clothes in the car, which is difficult for me, and pulled the bike out of the hatchback, which is easy. While I was getting my shit together I noticed this advertising sign stuck in the grass border around the parking lot.
For Family & Friends
This saddens me. Not so much that somebody has started a shuttle service to the local prisons (For Family and Friends) – if there is a need, there should be someone to fill it. It saddens me that there is such a need.
And look at that bus! I can see chartering a van to take my friends and family for an afternoon visit at the slammer… but who could fill up that bus? That thing has a dual rear axle – that’s a serious hunk of bus there. Are they are thinking about more than mere visits? That bus would be useful for a prison break. You could take a whole unit over the fence and drive them to a nice afternoon at a baseball game all for one low price. I wish that was true… over the obvious fact that there are enough folks up the river that you can fill a bus up on visiting day.
Across the parking lot is a cheap gas station that has a constant flow of shady characters moving in and out with bags full of bottles. I guess the people that run the shuttle service figured out (maybe with extensive research and a focus group or two) that friends and relatives of incarcerated jailbirds tend to walk through this lot – maybe carrying their cheap booze to the train. People riding the train with alcohol won’t have a car they can drive to the pen. They would need a shuttle.
I haven’t seen that ad anywhere else.
So I climbed on my bike and went for a short ride. My head never stopped pounding, so I only went a half-dozen miles or so, stopping at a shady bench to read a short story on my Kindle. While I was loading my bike back in the car for the trip home I watched a few folks walk through the lot… but nobody asked for a pen so they could write the phone number down.
The looping trails through the Spring Creek Natural Area converge on a little footbridge over the creek. There is a nice bench there - a good place to rest and get away from the city for a few minutes.
This is the time of the year full of those rare North Texas days of cool mornings and warm afternoons. I can feel the killer heat of summer crouched on the horizon, ready to pounce. But in the meantime, it is so nice, so much of a shame to be cooped up in a cubicle for so many hours. When the whistle sounds, I want to be outside – to capture as much of this time as I can in preparation for the blazing oven season ahead.
There is this spot – the Spring Creek Natural area – where the concrete bike riding trails enter some thick creekbottom floodplain woods and loop around to give a bicycle rider the illusion of being outside of the city for a few minutes.
Candy and I have swapped cars for a few days. The car I have now is a tiny hatchback – much smaller than the one I drive on most days. With the back seats folded, however, I discovered my bicycle can fit in the back without even taking either wheel off. Maybe I’ll keep driving this car and carry my bike with me – get in some quick rides in different parts of the city. Maybe I don’t have to spent my money on a folding bike.
Candy was worried about leaving my bike in the car. “I bought it for used for ninety dollars twenty years ago,” I told her. I remember now, I was saving to buy a bike and then found this one at a pawn shop. I figured it could get me by until I saved enough for a decent one. I guess I have my money’s worth. “You’ve put a lot into it, though,” she said. Well… not really. Tires and tubes, of course. I had to buy a new brake lever/shifter set – but I found that on clearance and paid less than fifty dollars for it. I need to buy a new chain – but those are cheap – the thing has been slipping cogs if I push too hard and I think the chain is worn.
The bike is a hunk of crap – but I’ll take it apart, clean and lube it… one more time.
I rode around the Spring Creek woods, taking it easy. I’d stop every now and then at a place with a bench and read a story on my Kindle. Sometimes I’d check the baseball scores on my phone. That’s a nice way to waste a day.
After hanging out in the dappled sunlight of the woods for awhile, I thought about how nice it would be to have other people do this. We could ride along the central trail along 75 to Eastside and grab a burger, maybe a cold beer, then ride back. Never happen, but I rode the route anyway, just to see if it was doable. A nice little ride, actually. It’s a shock to leave the deep, muffled forest and be suddenly along a screaming eight-lane highway, though the trail makes the ride easy. I didn’t get anything to eat, but sat on a bench at Eastside for a bit, watched the folks come and go before cruising back down into the woods.
I wanted to go on a bike ride on Saturday. After thinking about it I came up with a plan – get up and drive down to White Rock Lake with my bicycle in my trunk, then ride the Santa Fe Trail from there to Deep Ellum, eat breakfast at Cafe Brazil, then ride back.
Unfortunately, when my alarm went off and I dragged myself out of the sack I felt like crap. Tired, sick, and achy – the last thing I wanted to do was go out and put forth physical effort. So I shuffled around the house and felt sorry for myself. By eleven I was feeling a little better – took some deep breaths, and went ahead and set out. I filled the water bladder on my new pack and drove down to White Rock.
I worked on my bike in the parking lot for a bit. The old thing needs some serious work, and I didn’t have the parts, tools, or mechanical knowledge. The worst part is that the seat is crapped out. The front plastic part has broken off and the rest of the seat simply is sitting on the rails. Against my better judgement, I set off on the trip downtown. It isn’t that far, really, and I decided to simply gut it out.
The Santa Fe trail is very cool. It follows the abandoned rail bed of the old Santa Fe railroad and runs from a connection with the White Rock Lake Trail down to Deep Ellum near downtown Dallas. Near the lake, the trail winds through some thick woods but as it emerges into East Dallas it runs straight through some neighborhoods
And that is what makes it so cool and unique. It has a real urban feel to it – although it is straight, smooths and away from traffic. The mostly Hispanic neighborhood, full of brightly colored car repair spots, small churches, and Mexican Restaurants seems to have embraced the trail that cuts through their midst – a lot of the houses along the trail have been cleaned up and repainted and the folks sitting out on their porches smile and wave to people riding by. Music pours out of open windows and bass beats from passing cars.
El Paisano Restaurant along the Santa Fe Trail in Dallas. Menudo!
The trail has a long, slow, uphill climb before it drops down into Deep Ellum and I could tell that I was not feeling very well. I toughed it out, though and did pretty well until I left the trail and was wandering on the streets, cutting over to the restaurant. The seat fell off my bicycle and the best I could do was to jam it back in place. It would slip back off every couple blocks, which made riding uncomfortable and difficult.
I locked my bike to a meter in front and went in and ate. I took a table where I could see my bike – though I can’t imagine anyone stealing that piece of crap. Instead of breakfast, I had a late lunch, and then headed back.
On the trip back up the Santa Fe Trail to White Rock I had a full scale bonk. Bonking is where your blood sugar gets so low that you lose your strength, energy, and will to live. I had eaten a lunch but it wasn’t designed for quick digestion and was actually making me sick. I was having to stop every few minutes to try and find some way to keep the bicycle seat in place – that didn’t help much either. It is pretty exhausting to ride a mountain bike without a seat on it.
But I made it back. It’s humiliating to have so much trouble on such a short bicycle ride, but I’m working on it. I’ve done this before – but I was a lot younger then. I remember the difficulty of getting back into the habit of riding regularly and riding hard – it is the bonk days that do you good. What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.
Actually, I’m complaining too much. It was a nice day out (a little warm – our cool spell is already fading) but I enjoyed riding around Deep Ellum, taking some pictures, and cruising through the ‘hood.
Now, I’m thinking of getting my old Raleigh road bike out and fixing it into riding shape. It’s not as good of an urban bomber as my mountain bike, but it is a much more efficient trail machine. I can start stringing rides together – Preston Ridge, Cottonwood, then White Rock Creek, then White Rock Lake, then Santa Fe Trail. I could ride from the Collin County Border all the way to Downtown Dallas, hang out in Deep Ellum and then ride back. No way could I manage that right now… but maybe… A good goal.
A sliver of a vacant lot along Elm Street was piled with recovered building materials. Cool stuff.
An old water tower rises above Deep Ellum.
An old sign for the Boyd Hotel
The Boyd Hotel is one of many historic buildings in Deep Ellum. Built in 1916, it is one of the oldest hotels still standing in Dallas. This building is one of the few remaining cast iron front buildings. Bonnie and Clyde and many of Deep Ellum’s Blues musicians stayed at the Boyd. Now it’s the home of some upscale offices and a fancy restaurant.
Elm Street
A lot of interesting stuff is painted on the walls.
Club Clearview and Blind Lemon - in the heart of Deep Ellum. The entertainment district has seen better days (several times over the last century) but it is hanging in there. So are we all.
A DART train crossing over the White Rock Creek trail a mile or so north of the lake.
Whenever I can, I want to try and ride my bike after work – at least while there is a bit of light and the weather is bearable. On Wednesday I was only able to get a quick trip up the Preston Ridge trail, but on Friday, I had a little more time so I drove from work over to a little park at Hillcrest and LBJ. I was going to ride the White Rock Creek Trail.
Living in one city for a long time means that whenever you go somewhere you not only see what is in front of you, but also layers of memories and nostalgia of things that have happened before. The White Rock Creek trail certainly has decades of memories for me.
But today, I had to get my bike working, the seat is falling apart, the gears are out of adjustment and, of course the engine is all gone to crap. I pedalled around in the parking lot adjusting things – watching the front dérailleur while I pedaled, I rode smack into a steep curb and fell on my ass. Not a good start.
I thought about bailing, but went ahead and barreled on down the trail. The trail runs from north of LBJ on down to join up with the trail that circumnavigates White Rock Lake. The lake trail is the first real major trail in Dallas, and the creek the second (as far as I know).
I was living near the lake when it was built… maybe ’83? – at any rate I rode it right after it was built. That was almost thirty years ago. Though my bike riding has some huge gaps in it – only now am I getting serious about getting back again – there are a lot of memories of riding that trail. I’ve been down it hundreds of times.
The trail is about seven and a half miles long and flat as a pancake. There is a lot of construction where it crosses Northwest Highway near the south end – so I wouldn’t ride quite the whole thing – I’d leave out the southern mile or so.
What’s nice about this trail is that even though it cuts through the heart of the city, the wooded creekbottom land it is built on gives the feeling of being out in the country. The trail has been widened and improved over the decades and now is very smooth and easy with well-done crossings under roads and over water.
I wasn’t sure if I would be able to ride the whole 13 mile round trip before it was too dark but I made it without any trouble – even though it was pretty dark when I reached my car. I even took the time to stop under a DART bridge to get a couple pictures of the train going by. That spot is usually swampy with a large lake under the bridge and water flowing across the trail. There isn’t anything left except a wide puddle and a lot of dried, cracked, ex-mud.
Back near the north end is the spot where a favorite sculpture of mine used to be – I wrote about it a while back. Now there is a megachurch sprawling out from the office buildings. I wonder what they did with the sculpture?
This is the mystery sculpture that stood for years in a vacant lot along LBJ freeway. The White Rock Creek trail runs under the bridge in the background.
Here's the same spot today, from the other side. A Megachurch is growing, sprawling out across the weedy fields.
It’s easy to get in a long bike ride on a weekend – the hard thing is to keep it up during the week.
On Wednesday, I gave it a shot – looking for trails near my work. I had my bike in my trunk and chugged as much water as I could in my last hour at work.
I drove over to a run-down shopping center at Coit and Spring Valley – only a couple miles from my office and changed in my car. I should have changed at work, but I’m not ready to walk through the building in shorts and a t-shirt.
I was going to ride the Preston Ridge Trail. It runs north from where I was all the way to the George Bush Tollway in Collin County. It’s the northern leg of the string of trails – Preston Ridge, Cottonwood, White Rock Creek, White Rock Lake, and the Santa Fe Trail which now form an unbroken chain from the northern suburbs to downtown Dallas. Hopefully, soon, I”ll be in good enough shape, both physically and mechanically (my bike is falling apart) to take a long day and ride the whole thing.
Unfortunately, when they built the George Bush Tollway they didn’t put in any connector under the road, and the Preston Ridge in Dallas does not connect with the same trail in Plano running north. If it weren’t for that little gap, you could ride a bicycle all the way from Highway 121 to Downtown without fighting traffic at all. It really aggravates me that when they put in a multi billion dollar tollroad they can’t make a little space for a bicycle to slide under.
I didn’t have enough time to ride the whole trail – my intention was to go north about three and a half miles to McCallum and then turn around and come back. The sun would be setting on my return trip. If you drive up Meandering Way (the street the trail parallels) you will say the road is flat, but it does rise between Belt Line and McCallum – so I would be riding out uphill and into the wind and returning down and with the wind at my back. This is good.
An easy seven mile ride is no big deal – but I am exhausted after work and the temptation to go home, eat, and collapse into bed is a strong one. It took willpower to drive, change, and assemble my bike from the trunk.
The only problem with this route is that the trail south of Belt Line Road slices through a very dicey neighborhood. The concrete is covered with broken glass, spray-painted gangsign cover every vertical surface, and groups of disreputable-looking characters start to gather as the sun starts to go down.
But I made it through alive and in one piece. I might try to find a starting point a bit past this area, though… for the next time.
One of the nice little rest areas on the Preston Ridge Trail. They call it a "node." You can see how the trail runs under the right-of-way for the power lines.
Like a lot of trails in Dallas, this one runs underneath a set of high-tension power distribution towers. This is good because it gives a lot of open free running space, perfect for a connector trail. The only problem is that it is pretty damn ugly. They do their best to spruce it up, with landscaped “nodes” and other plantings, but they can’t put in real trees (because of the overhead power lines) and it’s all pretty much lipstick on a pig.
I stopped for a blow at one of the nodes and chatted with a guy that was there watering the landscaping – obviously a local trail volunteer. He hooked a short hose up to a hidden tap and used two five gallon buckets to shuttle water to the planted beds. The landscaping at this place was done with drought resistant plants but he said it had been so dry he had to walk out and irrigate it every week. Most summers he said he only had to water once or twice for the whole season.
It was a nice ride – there were a lot of people out on the trail enjoying the… if not cool, at least bearable… evening.
I made it back to my car just as darkness filled in completely and the creatures of the night began to creep out. I nice little ride. Now I need to work on a spot where I don’t think about getting my throat cut.
Bill Chance 