Back in the 1980’s one of my most traveled routes included Roman Forest. I lived in New Caney at the time and the roads seemed in primitive condition compared to now. East of US59 the roads are not as smooth or extensive as the west side is what Jerry Turner, owner of Bicycles Etc., told me when I asked about where to ride. But I found some back roads off of FM1485 one of which took me to the back entrance of Roman forest. Lately this area sprung up in some local controversy involving the East Montgomery County Improvement District and developers of a pie-in-the-sky dinosaur park. The Tribune (Atascocita, Humble, Kingwood, Lake Houston one) reports on the latest news in almost every weekly issue. Money, costs and taxes weave throughout the events. There ought to be a movie about this. There is mystery, money, hidden agendas and more.

My route today took me either through or along the far east edge of the much talked about dinosaur park and I can safely say I did not see one dinosaur. I did see a bunch of overgrown weeds and some streets that once belonged to a housing development gone bad. This route is unique in the combination of streets and roads I put together. I ended up biking 33.3 miles. The first 9 miles made up the unique part of this particular route because I used my new Kingwood exit path. On FM1485 east I went past the new entrance to Lake Houston Wilderness Park. This large park is owned by the City of Houston and the new entrance makes the park much more accessible than the winding back roads going to the original entrance. The park offers biking trails but I have not ridden them.

After passing the new entrance I traveled further east on FM1485 to Casey Ridge. One of my former riding buddies told me stories about this area. I will leave it at the East Texas woods hides some secrets better forgotten. Turning off of FM1485 I went through rough streets, not so much in texture as in houses and yards in need of some up keep. Thankfully the dogs all reside behind some good fences. Deer Run Lane is the street that took me to the dinosaur park area which changed to Galaxy Road when I entered into Roman Forest. Roman Forest has some history of its own too as a development that almost became a ghost town. More on that on another bike ride.

My 33.3 mile route took 2:05:21 to complete at an average speed of 15.9 mph with a max speed of 22.1 mph and average cadence of 81.6 RPM. The wind stayed calm most of the ride but it was warm at 86 to 95 degrees. Fortunately the humidity stayed low at 44% but I still lost a lot of water. Mostly cloud skies and lots of tree shade along those back roads moderated the heat. Something I don’t mention much is the elevation gain and loss. This route did not include any climbs but I did accumulate +1887/-1925 of elevation change on the route. This might sound like a significant amount but when you look at the chart below it occurred over the whole route.

Mileage as of now: 65.19 this week, 139.29 for June, 2929.66 YTD. Starting tomorrow the rain chance increases for several days so I may get some rest days. For other ride data views visit these links: Garmin Connect and RideWithGPS.com.