the big push

july 23, 2011-
back to front again:

making black beans and rice at the Shepherd Sanctuary with a jalapeno from a garden in Brenham-

roughly 40 miles covered today. currently staying at the above mentioned place, The Shepherd Sanctuary, this place truly is a sanctuary, it's a beautiful home out in the sticks, out side of Shepherd; Shepherd pop. 1544, one of the larger towns i passed through recently- (there are dead ants in my tent from the last place i camped, i suppose the ants from this place can eat them...)

The Shepherd Sanctuary looks like a place right out of south Austin, it has hodge-podge of discarded "this and thats" as it's decor: bottle trees, a woven grapevine archway, totem pole, palms, various Buddhist and Hellenistic statues, ethereal wind chimes. The cabins with their various odd colour combinations and mix-matched doors and window frames are all built by the owner, Peach. the cabins are connected by decking, including an out door shower and bathroom. it cost ten bucks to pitch a tent here and that includes access to the kitchen and what ever is in the cupboard and the showers too; there is also an indoor shower which has moon stones and tile!

- Peach accepted my proposition of trading music for lodging which is nice since after i payed ten bucks to camp in Sam Houston National Forest i then learned it is free to camp anywhere in a National Forrest-however my cd's don't seem to work in my computer...so i'm hoping they work somewhere... (oh yeah, i'm drinking watered down sunkist right now, the first soda i've drank in something like ten or fifteen years-)

-the ride from Sam Houston was pleasant, i passed up an opportunity to go see a "hangin' tree" in Coldspring, Texas. yes! an actual bonnafied hangin' tree. that's what it used to be, now it is apparently a peaceful picnic area. they told me it was a giant oak with branches that drooped to the ground.
i would have loved to have seen it but i just wanted to get to Shepherd... while in Coldspring i also spoke to some kids that were conducting (under christian parental supervision) a car wash in the parking lot of the super market, and they were astounded that a person could and would ride their bike across the country. they were real sweet kids, high-school age if you can believe it, but they were real sweet, i wish i coulda chilled longer there to talk to them some more.

i'm noticing how homogeneous these towns are. you hear a lot about that and i wish i could dispute it but i'm seeing it a lot in places that i hoped would be uniquely rural. perhaps it's just wishful thinking for my part. it was also kind of a bummer to hear that girl say, "i couldn't even get down the street." (on a bike) those kids seemed curious and intelligent and i hope they do some great with themselves someday.

no mater how homogenized these towns are, playing Brad Paisley in every supermarket, there is always at least one really cool person i meet, so i'm sure there are a couple more out there... ie, in New Waverley, i met this guy Carson, who did paint and body work but he also was an arborist which he liked doing because it kept him in touch with nature and had nothing to do with chemicals. he's a fella that gave up the city life because it's for the birds. he told me to watch out for the crackheads in west Shepherd he said they "glowed in the dark". he also told me that if i came through town again, that i could camp at his place.

yesterday i took a day off from riding and rode roughly eight miles from Richards, Texas to the aforementioned Sam Houston National forest where i camped with several large communities of ants, little bitty red ones, orange ones, black ones, medium sized red and blacks and huge black ones- it seems that the little bitty ones have Napoleon complex or are just rabid flesh eaters, they like to bite.

other than that it was a
peaceful day full of worry, contemplation, planning and yes songwriting. i wrote a song that is sort of just a crooked riff with improvised lyrics over it about a man i met back in Brenham. another one of those rare small town gems, a person who is open and outlandish and kind of crazy. but i'll get to him in a bit. ( i wish i would have taken his picture).

Thursday i stayed at The Check Point at Mexican Hill Ranch in Richards, Texas. this place is owned by another character, a retired army engineer and his German wife. she tends the animals, milks the cows feeds the chickens etc, he runs the inn. the place is kind his party habitat and get away place for his friends and loved ones, (although it seems his relatives can't seem to pull themselves away from there city lives in Houston long enough to come visit him- that seems to bother him a bit) but when none of his friends are around, he feels like the place sorta goes to waste so he decided to open it up as a lodging and camping place for bikers. he's really into Harleys too. the bikers never came, but the cyclists started showing up, so now he mainly caters to cyclists. it's pretty cheap too, and you get access to the kitchen, laundry and a friggin' swimmin' pool. the overall vibe of it more countryfied than the funkyness of Shepherd Sanctuary. Ernie is the guy's name, he likes to hang out and talk with his guests. he even has an annual bluegrass gathering! go figure.



Anderson was a sweet little country town between Navasota and Richards- that place had a real nice vibe- i spent about 15 minutes there....
Navasota i spent a half an hour, i really just wanted to get to Mexican Hill Ranch.

So Brenham was like a small town out of a Twilight Zone episode. it seemed that everyone there was completely Christian and pre-programed, kind of like "the stepford wives", the kids weren't programed to answer questions pertaining to street names or about what they did for fun. they did have wi-fi though.... i just missed what seemed to be a great connection with an Austrian woman who didn't receive my couch surfing request until the next day but i went to a local bar and drank two beers and smoked a cigar with this amazing and crazy dude named Rusty. i don't mean crazy in a negative way he was rad and generous enough to let me camp in his backyard. he's the type of guy you want to be on your side in a fight though, this dude is an outlaw, yet an outlaw who is taking care of his elderly mother.

it was karaoke night at this bar where i met Rusty, Rusty was insisting that i sing a song and i was insisting that i don't do karaoke, so he's like, "you play banjo right?" and i say,"yeah" he says, "go get your banjo a play a song!" so i did. you could here a pin drop in there while i was playing Sally Anne, (until i told them all about how hot Sally Anne was and how they all wanted to marry her too, even the ladies) -so that went well, and i went to Rusty's place to crash and he came home later after he got kicked out for almost fighting this cowboy dude who was jealous because she high fived Rusty. that's when i learned more about his story. he offered me food and drink and the next day he literally threw me some jalapenos out of his garden.

before i got to Brenham i passed through Burton, pop. 300. stopped at this joint called the Four Corners Barbecue. they gave me free food and lemon/strawberry-aid. i sat with those folks for about an hour and learned about Orangetta's past as a A&R rep for a Gospel Music label and how she organized various events to help energize the community. her and her hubbie Pearcy where real sweet people; but for the life of me i can't remember what brought them from Alabama to Bruton, but do i remember she spent some years driving a truck for a living and they used to deliver the mail to Burton and several surrounding cities.

Orangetta and Pearcy gave me vague directions to Brenham, but they checked out with what i got off the interweb which vaguely checked out with what i got form Jesus at Taqueria Chihuahua, Authentico Comida Mexicana in Giddings. that dude was really cool, he comped my breakfast just because he saw me on my bike. the food at that place was killer!

(i think people give vague/bad directions in their home town because they are so used to gettin' around in it and they take for granted what strangers are not going to already know.)

though it's fraught with questions and difficulty, this trip is great, on the way to Shepherd
i realized that since i'm covering forty miles a day, i can predict when i'm going to get some where so i can book shows- which is cool cause thus far the trip has not been extremely musical and i have yet to meet anyone who plays traditional music, weather it's bluegrass, or polka or Mexicana or whatever. music used to be everywhere.....

july 24, 2011-
i played a small little show for the folks at the Shepherd Sanctuary, and they really appreciated what i was doing. that was nice because in the recent past i have been a bit shaken about what i've been doing musically so it was great to have people i've never met before enjoy it that much.
they were impressed because i played banjo in a way that they had never heard before and then i come to find out some of these folks are related to Alan Munde! Alan Munde, by the way, is a Banjo King! i wish i would have shot photos of Peach and her friends they were really great folks.
this morning i was sent off with way too many pancake and sausage and egg in my belly, which was cool because i didn't have to eat a morsel for twenty miles.

-and today i rode through forty miles of trees way out in the middle of NOWHERE, now i'm in Koutnze, which seems like the middle of nowhere and tomorrow i'm going to camp at the United Methodist Church in the middle of Kirbyville, TX and the next day i'll be in Louisiana!


thanks for readin'
Adam