Don, Anne and I launched from our house Sunday morning. Our destination was the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge’s eightieth anniversary celebration. Trailnet had organized rides that originated from the bridge, but we figured we could bike to the bridge and back. On the way downtown through the Park we stopped and showed Don one of the All Star Arches.
The paper was full of articles on the Citygarden. This is a two block urban garden situated on the Gateway Mall. It is estimated to have cost forty million dollars. Citygarden is suppose to have a rivers theme. It is located off Market, between 8th and 10th. It doesn’t open to the public until Wednesday and is still enclosed in chain-link fence. I shot the photo of it, at the top of this post, through the fence.
Immediately after leaving the Citygarden site we bumped into another aspect of urban America, homelessness. I was leading and chose a pathway through a garden area of the Mall with raised walls. The path had a number of right angle bends, so it wasn’t until I was already committed to this pathway, that I saw the homeless man sleeping on the pathway. I passed without any reaction from him and I think that it was the same for the other riders.
We hit the south end of the Riverfront Trail and started heading north. We stopped for water at the Mary Meachum Freedom Crossing Site, a historic underground railroad site, and subsequently a former Coast Guard Station. I saw and photographed a tom turkey along the trail. Subsequently, at the bridge, I photographed a Great Blue Heron and the heron’s tracks in the muddy Mississippi’s river bank.
When we made it to the Old Chain of Rock’s bridge we met several Team Kaldis members that had done the ride(Mark and Merri, Paul, Jena, Jim and Diana). We had beer and brats. We rode across the bridge and turned around and headed for home. Last November, I did a movie about this bridge. Anne took the picture of me below, while biking. I had found the American Flag by the side of the trail, recognizing good swag, I put a flag in my cap and became a Yankee Doodle Dandy. On the way home we stopped at the Fountain on Locust. We got forty-five miles.
OK – I admit confusion.
The top picture looks like a bridge, not a garden.
And is the toppled head standing in for your sleeping friend?
The guy that sits at the exit ramp near our house and requests donations waved at me this morning (I am not near enough to donate), so I waved back. I always try to acknowledge those that are out and about on my meanderings.
Jay, the very top picture, the skinny one, is the header in Marquis’s terms. It showed the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge, part of Route 66, The Mother Road. Today it has the turkey. The CityGarden is a sculpture garden, with landscape plantings , and sculptures like the toppled head photographed by Mark. Sot the header is the very top, but the top photo that stays with the entry is the sculpture.
Regarding the homeless man, I’m pretty sure he was still asleep, so we didn’t say anything or wave to him, so as not to wake him up. However, I was very surprised when I came around the corner and there he was. I almost ran over him! There probably isn’t much foot traffic there on Sunday morning, let alone cyclists. We only went through there b/c the street next to the City Garden was one-way, the wrong way, and to retrace our steps would have meant crossing 6 lanes of traffic on Market Street.
–Pooh
I was just confused about the sideways head. What the heck? (Didn’t have time to comment until now.)