Bicycles of Black Rock City
BLACK ROCK CITY, Nev. — For the most part cars are not allowed in Black Rock City and there is no subway.
One can travel the dusty expanse of the city on foot or maybe an art car, but the fastest and easiest way to get around is by bicycle. Of course the 5 mile per hour limit for art cars applies to bicycles, but it’s still fast to get around.
Once burners arrive in the city, their cars or trucks are parked in their camps and left until it’s time for the exodus. There are exceptions for emergency and law enforcement, of course.
Early in the week, I took advantage of the open space of the deep playa to ride the fastest sprint I could. I brought my brakeless track bike, complete with narrow tires and 78-inch (6.3 meter) gearing. I pun to the top of the gearing over the playa surface, which is like concrete with small bumps covered in baby powder.
If you go fast enough, it smooths from bumps to vibration. One needs to keep in mind the unicycles, chariots and other creations and the occasional soft spots in the playa surface. Or maybe being distracted by people shouting Shakespearian quotes in the manner of the Macho Man Randy Savage. I had to do some explaining to my Irish counterparts.
Most people — the smart burners — have fat tire cruisers or mountain bikes and don’t have high-speed runs across the desert. They slowly cruise from camp to camp, or maybe to some art installation or the porta-potties. Maybe to center camp or BMIR.
Bikes are the de facto way to get around and not only a vehicle for transportation but a vehicle for self-expression.
The kid was shooting people with the water gun whilst being pulled around.
Want to shoot fire with a propane puffer? No problem, fuck yea.
These trucks are a welcome exception to the no driving rule.
Embrace the dust. There is no escape from it.
North American Cycle Courier World Championships
AUSTIN, Texas — Bike messengers from all over the country gathered in the south-west corner of Austin for the 2011 North American Cycle Courier World Championships.
The race was the end of a week-long series of events and races starting with track races at the velodrome Houston the weekend before and finishing with the weekend of chaos in Austin — including a ride between the two cities. During the week the racers were invited to race weekly cyclocross and a criterium races in Austin. The Friday before the race, after registration, there was an alley cat race and gold sprints at Cheer Up Charlie in east Austin.
Qualifying for the main race on Sunday happened Saturday. The top 30 percent qualified for the three-manifest race Sunday. For the qualifier, racers were organized by their race numbers and started 10 seconds apart. The course is actually a road course car race track and the riders could only ride clockwise around the track and had to pick up packages in a very specific order, but could drop off in any order. If a rider missed a pick up, they had to ride a lap to go back.
The rain forecast for the weekend made the race organizers change their plans a little. The main race had virtual or “understood” packages, which still had to be picked up in the same order as they appear on the manifest and could still drop in any order. The main race had three manifests and half of the riders were given one and half another. They each had to complete one manifest, then get another. All of the racers had the same final manifest.
The main race had the typical alley cat start, where the bikes are laid down in order facing the same direction. At a signal, the rider run up to their bikes and the race is on.
The racers had some time to figure out basic routing so they didn’t have to do it as they raced. Although they have to pick up in order, they can drop in any order, usually on the way to pick ups. Keep in mind the race was done in laps and the check points were numbered one through 10, with 10 following 1.
The first checkpoint was sponsored by . During qualifying, the racers had to stop to have a portrait shot before running under the tent to step through race car tires before getting to the table. During the race, there wasn’t any photography but the racers had to sign or tag or scribble on one of two Chrome messenger bags.
The ninth checkpoint was a bit of chaos. I think it was sponsored by a shoe company, but all I remember is the cloud of marijuana smoke (no, it was annoying) and the guy with meth teeth. They were trying to jam Pringles into the riders’ mouths. It was hilarious. They were so enthusiastic, compared to the more subtle second and third check points.
The eighth checkpoint, on the inside of uphill esses, got pretty muddy and resembled a cyclocross course near the end of the race.
I can’t help but think if I didn’t talk to the people so much at check points, if I wasn’t so careful packing the packages (I did it for riding through Manhattan in traffic in bad weather, not for a wide race track in a race) and if maybe I got rolling faster from the check points I would have qualified. I don’t know. I’m not the slowest guy in town and I can still rip through traffic like when I was a NYC messenger, but it’s been a couple of years and many of the people with whom I competed do it every day. Many are at least 10 years younger, some are on TV. I don’t care, I had a good time.
Besides, if I were racing I wouldn’t be able to take photos of the racers whilst riding on the track with them.
Maybe I’ll get to go to the Cycle Messenger World Championships in Chicago.
Nocturnal emission in the city that likes to go to sleep
SAN ANTONIO — Few things are as good as blasting through the darkened quiet of empty nocturnal city streets.
Having no people, no cars or no bikes around — even if just for a few blocks — lets one’s mind wander a bit. It lets one’s eye focus on the shades of orange and green of the artificial light. The red and blue neon lights of the disposable and anonymous sports bars flicker past, their patrons standing on the sidewalk or shooting pool visible through hand-printed windows. They smoke, flick cigarettes, talk on cellphones or stare down to bright, little screens navigating the short-term future, which they may or may not remember in the morning.
Buses sway clumsily through the narrow streets as their daily service nears it’s end. The last few runs are modified downtown and have the buses parked for something called lineup.
A block later, green light spills into the darkened orange of the street, but farther in under strings of lights, laughter and conversation echo out into the empty street.
A block north, through a few cycling traffic lights and after pausing for stop signs people gather. A couple make their way slowly in a horse-drawn carriage illuminated with festive lights and a paid for smile from the driver. The clock, clump, clock, clump of the hooves fades into the night behind me and again, all I hear is the sound of tires rolling on asphalt, concrete and the odd stretch of cobbles.
Around a corner, left, right, stop, go. Families and friends looking for parked cars or where to meet other people walk quietly on the sidewalk. A jowled head above a stretched t-shirt watches a bike rider with a film camera around his neck roll past on a bike with no brakes, red and white lights blink interrupting the shadows.
A silver Volkswagen rolls past with a blonde girl int he back seat. She waves to me and smiles. I wave back and take a photo before slowing behind them, passing on the left and hurtling toward the darkness on a street with a name I can’t remember.
Over an orange overpass, under an orange underpass, through an orange intersection to a darkened orange sweeping right turn with a shadow from trees on the left, I wasn’t sure if I could turn off the street before it became an onramp for an expressway. Around the corner, a darkened right hard appeared, which took me right back toward South Alamo Street. Back to the pedestrians, the planners, walkers, seekers and those who are lost but wearing the clothes of those who are not.
Around and around again, straight, left, right, stopping, going, rolling quietly and full-bore sprints, few things are as good as solitude and otherworldly energy of night time.
They race in lingerie in Austin
AUSTIN — Whenever I complain about the skinny jeans and the general femininity of the hipsters (who still look dirty and homeless to me) and other trendy people, I need to remind myself about these races.
Two races in recent memory involved lingerie, the Linger Race a few months back in Eastwoods Park and the Drag Race a couple of weeks ago just after Frankenbike 66 wound down. The second race was also to celebrate the grand reopening of the east side bike shop, Fast Folks in their new location at 1030 East 6th Street.
Film in the digital world
SAN ANTONIO — The past two days were a good distraction from the drudgery of the horrible suburbs. The bike is still holding most of the 12 kilos of the sticky mud that washed over the concrete from the weekend’s rain. It’s no secret I don’t like the suburbs, although I have a very difficult time explaining myself to people who never left one — the outside world is vastly different in many ways.
The Leon Creek Greenway is astonishingly nice for this horrible, culture-less and lifeless suburb, but its a joke compared to what one may find in the civilized world. Every day it seems to double in size as more vegetation grows and it becomes more complete.
When I was in New York, I had pictures to post every day, I always had something to write about. Here, not so much. Every day is the same. One of the negative attributes to the suburban lifestyle, in addition to the excessive hidden cost and negative effect on one’s health, is the isolation.
I try not to bitch about it too much because no one dragged me here, no one forced me. Hell, it seemed like a good idea to leave New York City. It wasn’t of course. My leaving involved a Swiss girl for the most part, and probably some other excuses. The move was only meant to be temporary, but three years later I’m still here. The job I started in July gets worse every day — I never worked with such petty, unprofessional, immature and clearly self-serving people anywhere. I’m sure one of those idiots is monitoring this and three months from now some complaint letter or “report” will surface, detailing every word of this. By then this will be a memory and I’ll have to go back to read what they mean.
I’m sure it’s some sort of subconscious thing, but it seems every attempt or means to return to NYC is derailed or something comes up.
Today was pretty fun, but I think my standards for fun have lowered, or maybe I’m so used to the boredom that anything is exciting. I think a move will help, but there is more to the story (and I’m going to get into the details) and it’s more than just signing a lease somewhere.
The job thing, oh yes, the job thing. I lost count at how many times I sent a resume and cover letter — changing it for each job — to some distant place for a photographer job. I sent the things but I really don’t think anything will come of them. Maybe that is part of it, maybe I need to be more positive.
One of my excuses for not moving (other than the more important aspect above) is the “what if” I’m hired elsewhere and have to break a lease. Also, I don’t want to settle here, I don’t want to just give up and commit myself to a life of not living, but just waiting to die. There is no life here, no culture, no personality. Nothing.
Maybe it’s unfair to compare Austin and San Antonio to New York City. I don’t care, I’m doing it anyway. Looking back, the best two years of my life were in NYC and I really need to get back. Leaving is easy, returning is difficult.
For a while, I was shooting a lot of film pictures. Some of them were panoramic pictures from an awesome camera that shoots 360-degree panoramic pictures, spinning on a handle and powered my a mechanical drawcord-powered device. I shot pictures with the Soviet Leica copy Dave gave me when I left NYC (It’s my favorite camera) as well as the two Nikon n90s’s I have (they both have the MB-10 battery/vertical grips with lithium AAs).
The past two days, I carried a digital SLR with me so I don’t add to my film developing pile. I prefer film and film cameras for a number of reasons. I’m neither anti-digital nor afraid of technology, I just prefer how the cameras work. I don’t know, maybe if I had a Leica M9 and a new Mac laptop I would think differently about digital.
One unchanging law of the universe is your camera matters about as much as your bike or guitar. As long as they work (ok, a broken camera isn’t as good as a working one). An artist or professional can get whatever tools to work, finding the weaknesses and strengths and make magic.
I think there are many suburban wedding photographers and fans of HDR and photos of cameras and American flags who would argue that their new pedestrian, disposable plastic piece of shit of the week camera makes their crappy photos better. Look at Flickr for plenty of proof of that.
I just need to get out of here. It doesn’t matter. Maybe I can just go to the airport, get on the first plane to wherever isn’t here and just not worry about it any more.
A fine late autumn day in the city of the violet crown
AUSTIN — Austin is a good place to ride a bike compared to anywhere else I’ve ridden, except New York City. Sort of. New York is an odd exception in that it’s both awesome and horrible at the same time.
This specific day, December 18, 2010, was an average day in Austin. I stayed at my friend’s place in the northern end of the city and rode downtown, which is about 12 or 15 miles from her place to Cesar Chavez and Congress Avenue. South Congress and elsewhere is a little farther.
I normally stop by Juan Pelota, the cafe inside Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop on 4th and Nueces Streets for a chai. Sometimes I buy bike stuff, sometimes the chai, sometimes both. This time I bought some Gore Wind-Stopper gloves (they actually had my size and they’re very comfortable) and a copy of Rouleur magazine, issue 20. It has a feature about Japanese Keirin that is just awesome — great photos and wonderful writing giving some great depth into a rather secretive and exclusive sport.
I finished my chai on the patio as I gave the hefty magazine a perfunctory look-through while being distracted by the goings-on around me. As I began to leave, I saw a woman with Christmas lights on her bike walking it onto the patio. It was a green Surly Crosscheck with battery-powered lights wound around the top tube. She said they were from a ride or something earlier as she flicked the switch on the battery pack in a small, black seat bag.
After I left Juan Pelota, I rode around a bit, took a few photos. I rode past a Royal Blue Grocery on 3rd Street. It was more like a small urban grocery store than the other one across the street from Juan Pelota and I never knew it was there. I sat at a sidewalk table and looked a few things online. This location doesn’t have free wifi like their Nueces one does, but that didn’t matter much since I had the Sprint 4G mobile broadband thing with me. I decided I needed a hotdog and remembered Frank was right around the corner, confirming it online. I rode over, walked in and was seated immediately. The waitress was outrageously gorgeous (even by the high Austin standard of hotness) and very nice. For some dumb reason I had a bacon-wrapped hotdog with cheese and a side of poutine. Delicious, delicious regret.
I rolled myself out of there and out to my locked bike on the sidewalk. I thought I needed some coffee to blast all that grease and starch through. I remembered I’ve been meaning to go to Halcyon for a while. They have good coffee and make a motherfucker of a chai (yes, two in one day). The place has free wifi, a heated patio, comfortable seating that is loungy on one side and more like a bar on the other.
As I walked out to the patio with my coffee, I saw two people walking to a parked car on the Lavaca side of the place. The curb is very high — maybe shoulder height if my memory serves me well — and the car was parked close to it. The girl who was going to be the passenger waited as the driver moved the car out a little. I leaned over my locked bike (there are a few easy to lock places on the patio, which is really a wide, elevated sidewalk) and said she could come up there, jump over the railing and land in the passenger seat of the car through the sunroof. But I cautioned to aim carefully as to not become intimate with the gear shift. Yea, I got a sideways look for that …
I moved from the Lavaca side to the 4th Street side — the place is on a corner and has some funky and wonderfully dangerous stairs leading down to the street corner. They are round with a pole in the middle. I sat at a table on the edge of where the radiant heaters reached. I had my coffee and magazine and was almost reading it. Two girls and a guy — all dressed in Austin “I need to be seen here, dressed like this” uniforms — sat down sort of next to me. The guy was a very gay hair dresser at Bird’s Barbershop in Austin. He had coping issues. The two girls sort of repeated what the other said. They all held on to their predictable stereotypes with heroic tenacity.
“I need to be single for a while. I need to drink whiskey,” said the hairdresser about dating a guy 20 years older than him. He was sort of upset about it and everything else not fabulous. He told one of the girls he couldn’t even handle his little dog and had to give it to a friend for a while. At first I was trying to ignore them, but then I was completely eavesdropping, it was too crazy and funny not to.
A different guy walked up the worn concave steps from the street with a cardboard box in his arms. I saw as he walked up the stairs a large trophy protruding from the top of the open box. When he got closer I saw either a wig or a human head taking up most of the space around the trophy. He walked into Halcyon.
My paper coffee cup was empty for a while before I went back in. I had no intention of staying but I figured I would I would check out the inside of the place and see what their chai was all about.
Guy at Halcyon said chai is similar to the Hebrew word for life after I told him it was the Arabic word for tea. I told him whiskey comes from a similar Gaelic word meaning water of life. We both learned something. The chai came with two animal crackers and they had soy milk.
I took a seat on a couch after resting my chai and it’s large porcelain cup and saucer on the table without spilling a drop from the cup, which astonished the hell out of me.
The chai had the multi-layered, spiced and smooth flavor I expected but without the syrup-like consistency of the chai from Greenbeans Coffee. Starbucks chai can be a little weak. Juan Pelota, the coffee and gift shop in St. Davids Trinity Center and Halcyon do it right.
At some point I went to South Congress to look for Christmas presents at the small art thing there on the weekends. I spoke with a few people, bought a few things. I spoke with Jake Bryer, who had a very busy table selling photos printed on wood blocks of different sizes. He runs a gallery with photography but limits whom he represents to a geographic area around Austin. I packed everything into my well-worn, 10 year old Timbuk2 canvas messenger bag and headed back to the north side of the river. I think this is when the gastric assault began.
Some hours later after inspecting the nearly-finished Pfluger Bridge and the surrounding area, I headed over to the Nueves location of Royal Blue. Of all the photos I have of everything when I’m on my bike, I don’t have many of the bridge, at least the end of it. I’ll work on that. I went in looking for rootbeer and chocolate. I don’t remember the brand of root beer, but it was good. Not IBC, Virgil’s, Milligan’s Island, Maine Root or any I remember. I washed it down with a Kinder Bueno Bar.
Inside two girls were doing some sort of last minute gift shopping. They wanted to buy the very large jar of pickled red peppers on the counter. An employee said they use that stuff for their mayonnaise, but maybe it was for sale. He asked the other employee to try zapping it to see if it was in the system. It wasn’t. I suggested some sort of large cured meat product to one of the girls as they kept brainstorming for ideas. She asked the first employee about a large salami (no, not in a porno sense, although that would have been funny) as I walked out the door with my snacks.
I relaxed watching Austin go by in the quiet intersection of 4th and Nueces Streets as music played overhead. I headed back to my friend’s place shortly after.
Bikes move the developing world
SAN ANTONIO — The Alamo city is slowly modernizing its transportation infrastructure to 1930s levels, but it will take a very long time. Plans are underway to incorporate high speed, direct bus routes and later, public transit geared toward dense urban areas. Via Metropolitan Transit, San Antonio’s public transportation utility, is talented hiring people from all over the country to redesign and plan for an eventual future as an actual city.
Or maybe not, at least as far bike riding is concerned.
Several groups hold various organized bike rides for different reasons; from the last Friday rides that center more on partying in dark parking lots to the two different Tuesday night rides. One ride is mostly fixed gear riders with a loosely-planned route, while the other is more “cyclist” and heads south east around the Missions.
The Friday ride leaves from the Alamo around 9:30 the last Friday of the month.
Bike World and Blue Star as well as other groups have rides. Its possible to go on a different group ride every day, some days have two or more rides.
San Antonio is in nearing completion of its planned 40-something miles of bike paths as part of a green belt around the city. The Greenway doesn’t include the Mission Trails, which go from the Alamo to Mission Espada in San Antonio’s south east.
Sunday I spent some time in the Leon Creek Greenway, accessing it through O.P. Schnabel Park, in the north west side of the city.
The trails are mostly smooth concrete, although they vary within the park itself. They run from Potranco Road north to 1604 near University of Texas San Antonio, with spurs and off shoots to trail heads at housing communities.
The trails pass park areas, ponds and trees. There isn’t a car or street insight, which is a good change from the failed 1940s era policy of giving free infrastructure and subsidies to car companies.
On a mission at the Missions
SAN ANTONIO — I spent time this afternoon riding around the missions where the origins of the Alamo City lay.
On the maps there is an easy trail following the San Antonio River, but the reality is something else.
Construction and sloppy or missing signs make navigating the otherwise very pleasant ride a bit of an adventure. While Im always up for an adventure or alternate way somewhere, the Mission Trail is just confusing.
The northern terminus of the Mission Trail is in the middle of downtown San Antonio, the otherwise abandoned former urban area. Across from the Alamo is forgettable tourist attractions and corporate restaurant chains, much like the “famous River Walk,” the over developed area around the river downtown.
The southern terminus of the Mission Trail is Mission Espada. Along the way north to south, one will pass Mission Concepcion and Mission San Jose.
The route runs along the San Antonio River and passes Stinson Airport and an aqueduct from the 1700s. The route is a mix of urban streets, physically separated paths and quiet rural roads. Navigating takes trial and error, but a map doesnt hurt either.
On a nice day the route is popular with polished and shaved-down cyclists, regular bike people and everyone in between. During periods of more extreme weather, bike traffic is reduced.
The Mission Trail isnt part of the 40-something miles of bike trails and greenway in the works in San Antonio.
Roger Christian, a local advocate for bikes and smart transportation told me some of the bike infrastructure here impressed “some folks who came down from Austin.”
That impressed me given how advanced the bike infrastructure is in the city of the violet crown. The city is in the works of finishing the northern extension of the Pfluger Pedestrian Bridge over the Colorado River and now Cesar Chavez Street. Austin has numbered bike routes, and extensive green way and miles of separated bike trails and bridges.
In a recent election, the people of Austin passed Proposition 1, which adds funding for modern and sustainable transportation. The measure includes funding for bike lanes, traffic studies, a bike and pedestrian bridge around a portion of Lady Bird Lake and other measures. The proposition passed by about 55 percent.
I don’t know how many voted.
The plans for San Antonio include various types of bike paths, including smooth concrete and maintained dirt, connecting Leon Valley, the southwest and northeast sides and other areas making it possible to travel around the city without riding or running on city streets.
I dont have completion dates, schedules or other information right now, but a simple Internet search will yield plenty of information.
UPDATE: The Southern portion of the Mission Trail is closed. I mean really closed and not the sort of “closed” where one can walk around signs. Its a big, open construction site on the edges of the river. No word on Mission Blvd or the rest of it. At some point it may be finished, but they probably won’t tell anyone.
Or maybe they will, the restoration of the the Mission Trail is rather huge and impressive. A well-designed sign says it’s the largest urban eco restoration project in the United States. Here is their website
A race for the ladies in Austin
AUSTIN — It was a race for the ladies, as the flier said, held at the polo grounds at Eastwoods Park.
It seemed to be a race themed around lingerie, but lacking the nudity one can see at other Austin rides. Some of the racers brought a sense of humor, some brought seriously hot lingerie and one had Texas-shaped tassels.
Racers competed in teams of two, more or less.
First one team member raced a loop around the park, then after returning to the park, they had to complete a few check points.
The first was inflating a condom to about the size of a watermelon. More than one person disagreed with having a mouth covered in sex grease.
From there, they had to run over to be photographed making a sexy pose with their bikes. Naturally some were funnier than others, just like the costumes.
Some teams had to skip hand in hand from roughly the center of where everyone gathered to a tree-covered foot bridge while others had to run around to the back of the polo court with their bikes. There they had to team up on one bike with one racer pedaling and standing while the other was seated. They rode from one end of the court to the other, switched places and rode back.
After that, the teams rode another lap out near University of Texas, Austin and Eastwoods Park.
The bike polo games kept going the whole time.
Tuesday evening at the Blue Star
SAN ANTONIO — Group bike rides of various stripes and reasons leave from the Blue Star Brewing Company Bike Shop just about every night of the week.
Tuesday’s ride features mainly fixed-gear riders who tear through the darkened, quiet streets of the Alamo City from Blue Star on South Alamo to the Alamodome, Alamo Heights, near Brackenridge and back again. More or less.
The rides are generally broken up into two groups: boys and girls.
It doesn’t seem like there are many rules other than “don’t be a dick,” which is a general life rule. The ride meets at about 7:30 p.m. in front of the bike shop and leaves around 8:00 p.m., give or take.
Normally I keep the cameras out to take photos while I’m riding, but this time I didn’t. It was a smart move since the ride was fast — much faster than I expected.
