Another Texas July weather bike ride today following my “New Caney – Tavola – Valley Ranch” route for a total of 33.5 miles. This pouts me within 20 miles of my 800 mile goal for July. Calm wind below scattered clouds awaited me as I started riding at 10:42 am. The temperature began at 90 degrees and by the time I finished at 1:15 pm it was up to 97 degrees. This is the type of weather that reminds me of what I thought Texas was like before I moved here in 1971. Crossing the state line in Texarkana January 1st 1971 I expected to see oil wells every where with jackrabbits roaming the pastures. It didn’t take too many miles on the way to Dallas to find out my ideas were wrong.

The ride to Tavola went easier than the return trip even with the supposedly “calm” wind. Stopping at the New Caney Mobil station for ice and water I continued south through Valley Ranch to the Stripes station where I stopped for a couple of minutes in the shade to drink some water before riding to the traffic light and onto Briar Tree. Usually I ride through Oakhurst but today I changed to Auburn Trails exiting on the I-69/US59 south bound service road. I stayed on the service road to Kingwood Drive making the u-turn and passing the new but unopened Kingwood Emergency Hospital. Not sure what is going on with the hospital. They advertised in one of the area newspapers about a hiring fair a few weeks back but today there were three cars in the parking lot which is behind a construction chainlink fence.

No other cyclists crossed my route today. It is rare to see them when I ride to the north.

I wore a new pair of Bellwether Endurance Gel shorts that I received as a warranty replacement for a pair that the seam holding the gel pad in place unraveled. These are very comfortable shorts and fit well too. My fleet of five pair is back to full strength now.

No biking tomorrow but I plan on riding Friday to reach my goal for July.

Link to my Strava.com metrics and map

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