Katy Trip Day 1 (Home – St. Charles)

This is a multi-part trip report. If you haven’t already, you should start at the beginning. Remember that you can click on any of the photos to see larger versions of them.

Click here to see a map of todays travels.

The train’s late. I think the train’s always late. I’ve been sick all week, with a sinus infection, or allergies, or SOMEthing. We skip supper because all the drive thrus between our house and Little Rock have lines about eight miles long. We get to the station in plenty of time tonight, though, and box up our bikes and sit in the old station, waiting.

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Later, we settle into the lower coach of the quietly sleeping, nearly-full train. Bryan’s in a window seat next to a person-shaped blanket. Mandy’s on the aisle next to a grandmotherly-looking older woman who snores loudly. My seatmate is a middle aged woman with a half-full catheter bag. There’s something very wrong with her, though we can’t really have a conversation about it – her speech is garbled and confused. I move carefully as I doze, afraid to hurt her. But in the night, when my sleeping bag falls from my shoulder, I feel her pull it up and tuck it in around me.
Continue reading “Katy Trip Day 1 (Home – St. Charles)”

Katy Trip: Getting Ready

This summer, Mandy switched around her visit to Tulsa so that she could go to her Audubon camp.  That shifted the time we could set aside for a family vacation from super-hot early August to hopefully-nicer early June.

As a teenager, I rode parts of the Katy Trail in Missouri.  It’s about 250 miles of mostly-flat packed limestone gravel, running from St. Charles (just west of St. Louis) all the way across the state to Clinton, Missouri.  We’ve been wanting to ride the whole length of the trail as a family.  An early-June vacation seemed like a good time to give it a try.

Here’s a link to a map of the trail.

We bought a guidebook to the trail way back last year, and had been daydreaming over it ever since.  The Katy is the longest rail-trail in the US!  A landmark state park system!  With friendly little towns and ice cream shops and cyclist-centered campgrounds all along the way!  And historical thingamajigs!  All just one state north of us.

To make the trip a little more challenging (and fun), we decided to leave the car in Little Rock and do the whole eight-day vacation using alternative transportation.  We pieced together a route using mostly Amtrak, but also the public transit buses and light rail in St. Louis.  And, of course, the touring bikes.  It’ll be the longest trip any of us have ever taken by bike, and we’ll be doing it together.  With stops for ice cream.

CRF Mammoth for Memorial Day

While Bryan stayed around home to spend time climbing with David, Mandy and I made a trip to Kentucky to go caving.

We arrived around midnight and after signing us into the expedition, I poked my head into a few bunkhouse rooms before finding one with only one bed filled. Mandy and I threw down pillows and blankets and went to sleep. It occurred to me that in most places I’d feel pretty uncomfortable putting my daughter to bed in a darkened room with an unidentified man, but at Hamilton Valley I didn’t think twice about it. When she mumbled “I’m cold” in the middle of the night, he got up to turn on the heat for her. It turned out to be Tom Brucker. Continue reading “CRF Mammoth for Memorial Day”

Lake Sylvia by Bike

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We met Gordon and Lois and the girls for a two-day trip from the Lake Sylvia area out to Forked Mountain to spend the night.  It was a great ride – about 35 miles almost entirely on gravel, with some swimming and camping in the middle.  It was peaceful and quiet and traffic just didn’t exist.  Some of the hills were steep, but I figure that’s what I have feet for.  The bombing downhills were scary fun, but so hard that I twisted the headset on the Voyageur once as I fishtailed through loose gravel.  We got sunburns and dirt in our eyes.  Three of our group bailed halfway through, but the rest of us had a fine time.

There’s more gravel-road touring in our future; I’m sure of it.

PS – The photo of Bryan’s bike up top doesn’t actually have anything to do with this trip.  But we didn’t have any decent photos from this weekend, so we’re pretending that it  belongs here.

Chem2 is HISTORY

It’s been a difficult school year for me. I’ve only done seven hours for each semester, because Chemistry at UALR is very, very hard, apparently in order to discourage potential medical students. My advisor told me twice that most geology students take their chem classes at a nearby community college.

After the final, I went to Debbie Thompson’s house. We sat on her deck and watched the sun set and drank beer and burned all my chemistry notes.

I’m done. I ended up with high Cs in both chem 1 and chem 2. A year ago I’d never have believed I’d feel proud and relieved to see Cs on my transcript – I’m an A student! – but the fact is that these chemistry courses have bludgeoned my ego pretty thoroughly. Or maybe they’ve just taught me humility. I’m not good at everything. I’m learning to accept that.

I can go on to my other science courses now. I’ll never have to take another chemistry class again. This summer I’m taking an oceanography course, and next fall I’ll be doing physics and geology.

SCBPC Bike Polo Tournament

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Bryan returned from the Flashbus workshop in Dallas late Thursday night, and got up on Friday to go to MacArthur Park to help set up for the Southeast Regional Bike Polo tournament and play a few games of pickup. Mandy’s out of town, so I joined the group right after work to help out.  To kick off the weekend’s activities, Vinnie organized a nighttime alleycat race. Participants left from MacArthur, and had to pick up packages and bike parts at various places in Little Rock. Bryan and I volunteered to staff the station atop the Big Dam Bridge. Before signing off on their ‘manifests’ we made the racers hula-hoop for us. Continue reading “SCBPC Bike Polo Tournament”

Flashbus!

So… hell froze over and two photographers I admire (Joe McNally & David Hobby) teamed up to tour the country and lecture about off camera flash with small hotshoe flashes AND they were coming to Dallas AND it only cost $99.  Cha-ching, I’m there!

This isn’t a full on review or trip report and I didn’t take many photos but it was definitely worth the price of admission plus the air fare I spent to go to Dallas and back on the same day (slightly more expensive than driving myself and tons easier).  The photo above (click on it to see it bigger) shows about half ballroom that we were using at the Hilton Anatole, I believe there were 300+ people in attendance.

David shoots manual flash (mostly) and Joe shoots iTTL (mostly) and it was great to see them shoot while walking us through their thought process.  Seeing how they build up the lighting in the photo, how they control the shadows and background was really really useful.  You can only learn so much from books, seeing the process in person was the whole reason to attend.

Adoption Announcement

It's a DOG

We’ve decided to keep the puppy.  He’s been trying to be a good boy, and has already learned some commands like ‘sit’ and ‘wait’ and ‘come.’  He’ll grow up to be big and strong enough to stay outside during the day, and he’ll like coming with us on backpacking and hiking trips.  We’re getting him at the perfect age to teach him to behave and cooperate.  And he really needs a home, so even if we aren’t perfect puppy parents, his life with us will be a lot better than just being out on the street, or stuck in a shelter, or chained in some guy’s backyard.

We’ve enjoyed having Hayduke underfoot the last couple of weeks. We’re looking forward to seeing what kind of dog he turns out to be.

Kathy’s First Backpacking Trip – Caney Creek

Our good friend Kathy is a good campground-camper, but had never backpacked. She likes being outside, but she’d never actually carried all her stuff on her back and spent the night in the woods far away from everything. So we all decided that we should fix that. We picked her up after work on a Friday and drove to Shady Lake campground to spend the night and be ready for an early start on Saturday. Continue reading “Kathy’s First Backpacking Trip – Caney Creek”

Kind People Live Here

Dogs show up in our neighborhood and around our yard on a pretty regular basis.  They’re usually unfamiliar dogs, and they’re usually in good shape, clearly just stopping for a little smell around on their way someplace else.  We’re not above patting a head here and there, or making a phone call if there’s a number on a collar tag.  We provide a bowl of water if a drink seems to be in order.  But for the most part we don’t get very involved in the business of itinerant dogs.

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You may remember that, about a year ago, two beagles showed up at our house and took a long nap in the shade.  They didn’t seem inclined to leave, once we’d scratched their ears and given them some water.  They were tired and seemed like they needed some help.  We put out signs and put ads in the paper and took care of them for about a month.  Finally, we helped them find their home. Continue reading “Kind People Live Here”