zizou

some great pics, i've enjoyed looking through the thread

qmsdc15

MBT, get it straight, man!

Haha, I made the same mistake the first time I tried to spell it.

Most is actually public art, the murals under the Franklin Street bridge and along the retaining wall. The wall is 'longer than a football field', it's not actually on the trail, but you can see part of it from the trail.








There is graffiti everywhere.


It's hard to tell what is supposed to be there, but I guess most of the stuff on the sides of buildings was put there without the building owner's consent.




Vandals' graffiti over a sanctioned mural?


I think until recently, a chain link fence had to be scaled to get to these places, now it's pretty much wide open. Entry at 4th and S NE, the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception tiny in the distance.
]

I'd avoid going there during the week when they are working on it.

qmsdc15

Thanks, tulip for putting the idea in my head to discover a new route. Much in the spirit of Columbus who we celebrate today. To go where many have gone before and to claim the honor. What riches I have found though! You are my Isabella.

tulip

aw, shucks.

You are right, the area in your last picture was all fenced in, even before the building right north of the NY Ave Bridge was built (power company, I think). Occasionally the gate was left open, but I did get stuck there and had to backtrack. I thought about bringing wire cutters but then thought about all the cameras that are everywhere in DC and my goodie-girl took over and I dropped the idea. Nice to see that it's open now.

I'm just going to have to come up there for a ride on the trail! I'll pop the Bike Friday on the Amtrak and I can be at Union in less than 2 hours...I'll let you know and you can be my guide. CC, you should come, too.

qmsdc15

Yeah, come on up!

qmsdc15

Thanks. Welcome to bikleforums!

cc_rider

I might be available for a ride. Just need to schedule it around work and family and other rides.
But what I really want to do is a boundary stone grand tour. Maybe a combination of the NE and SE stones with the MBT graffiti tour to close the loop.

tulip

There's a boundary stone near where I used to live. It's on Eastern Avenue between RIA and Michigan, on the right as you're heading north on Eastern. It's in the yard of a nice-looking brick house and it has a cage over it like the other boundary stones. I always wondered what it would be like to have a boundary stone in my yard.

To get there, you can take the MTB up to Brookland/CUA Metro and then go up Otis. Take a detour onto 14th (left) to the Franciscan Monastery; it's beautiful. Continue on Otis (really nice area) across South Dakota and take a left on 26th NE to Randolph. Right on Randolph to Eastern, and left on Eastern for less than a mile. Then you can go into Mount Rainier and stop for coffee at Artmosphere on RIA and 34th and head back home by way of Galludet and Capitol Hill by winding around the neighborhoods on the south side of RIA. Ah, my old commutes!

I'm going to wait until spring to come up and ride the MTB.

cc_rider

I think you mean the NE5 stone, in the photo. I was there a few months ago. The house was abandoned and for sale. I get to it by Varnum, which crosses Eastern a half block away.

Maybe by spring the construction on the MBT will be finished.

There's one gap between stones I still need to figure out, Fort Lincoln cemetery to the stone south of NY Ave, but once I do I'll have a way around the entire route, with only a couple of stones out of easy reach.

qmsdc15

I cross Eastern at Varnum every morning! Tulip, did you ride a fixed gear? I remember a girl I saw a few times riding in on West Virginia Ave. Was that you?

tulip

No, no fixie. I lived in Mount Rainier and worked in Alexandria. Long story short: I'm no longer there. I Eastern at Perry. Occasionally I took West Virginia, but mostly I went through Brookland.

qmsdc15

I rode the MBT from M to NY Ave. and beyond.

Correction concerning the MBT. I was mistaken about the impasse at NY ave. and the drop off at M. I decided to take a closer look on my way home this evening. The trail actually appears to deadend at L st. (not M) where wooden stairs descend to the street level, but just before you get there, you can u turn and ride a ramp down to M. I rode up the ramp and onward north towards NY ave. This ramp is fully open, no orange cones or ribbons, no 'no tresspassing' or 'do not enter' signs.

At New York Ave. the path continues under the bridge, contrary to my earlier erroneous report that the bridge would need to be modified to make way for a path. It was obvious that I was riding through someone's living space here, but no one seemed to be home. The wet clothes hung everywhere to dry reminded me of how my place looks after a rainy day. At the other end of the overpass, the trail ends at a No Tresspassing sign, but I was tired and wet and forged on. I cut left as soon as I could (just past the Pepco substation) because this was the only way I knew for sure I could escape the fenced field there.

qmsdc15

19th street

I rode the wrong way for a couple blocks uphill with a loaded trailer to get a picture of this guy, Jack, because he had an interesting looking bike. Of the half dozen pictures I snapped of Jack, this was the best I got. Still struggling to get clear pics shot on the fly.

cc_rider

Got an email for some sort of commuter event on the MBT for next Monday.

qmsdc15

Where can I find out more about that event? WABA?

qmsdc15

Water Street, evening rush.

cc_rider

WABA

tulip

great photo. Let us know about the MBT event (how it goes...I can't be there).

qmsdc15

Thanks, lucky first attempt to pan, I didn't intend to cut off his bike, but I'm very happy with how it came out. I shot a lot of pictures under the Whitehurst that evening in a brief period of time after I finished my last job at 3333 K st. There is a rush hour of bikers flowing onto the Capital Crescent Trail. None of the other shots came out anywhere as nice as that one. A wife nagging her husband. Is it interesting just because it's not happening in a car?



I got excited and signed up for the MBT ride tomorrow thinking somehow that more of the pieces would magically connect if I was guided, but after thinking about it, it's unlikely the ride will connect the sections I've put together already on my explorations. I'm sure it will be fun. I guess I'll be leaving home two hours earlier than normal to meet the ride at it's start in Takoma Park.

qmsdc15

I left my house at 7:07, thinking it would take about 30 min. and expecting to miss the 7:30 Takoma Park start, and I did miss it. I rode the Northwest Branch Trail to the Sligo Creek Trail to Maple St. to Cedar following signs to Metro. I was 11 or 12 minutes late and they were gone.

I didn't have a good idea where to go from there, and after circling around for 5 minutes to make sure I was in the right spot and no one was waiting for me, I left with 13 minutes to make the 8:00 Brookland meet-up. I made pretty good (lucky) dead reckoning decisions, meandered once and u-turned once, but mostly stayed on what turned out to be a good course, some of which was probably the designated route, I think the MBT is on the road for most of the way from Takoma Park to Edgewood.

I got to the Monroe Street meet-up again 11 or 12 minutes late, but I did not slow any more than necessary to make the right onto 8th. Coming around the corner I saw a group of riders in the distance who I caught where they had stopped to look at the Edgewood Mural.

There were another 4 or 5 riders outside of the frame, a good turn-out.


Riding the last of this paved section.


Bypassing the unfinished part.


We continued on the dirt beyond where the paved trail resumed to avoid getting in the way of ongoing construction.


The last paved section untill NY Ave. ended at R st.


The group rode together from there on R to 1st NW, where we split off in different directions.

Rails to Trails Conservatory was guiding this ride. Thanks for the ride, not just today, but every day I use a rail trail that you have helped create. I rail trails.

tulip

Great! Thanks for the update!! That is such a great trail for that part of the District.

qmsdc15

The only news I have to pass on is that the trail is expected to be completed this spring.

This ride got me to my first stop about 30 minutes early. I took this picture of commuters on M Street while I was waiting for my pick up to be ready.

Cornflakes

Very nice shot

qmsdc15

Thanks. More luck than skill to be honest. Digital cameras are great, I never run out of film, and eventually a nice image is captured. I haven't read the user's manual yet, still using auto mode, but I've only had the camera for a year or two, I'll get around to learning how to use it someday, maybe.

qmsdc15

Illegals transporting stolen scrap metal in a stolen shopping cart don't like to have their picture taken. OK, OK, lesson learned. I forgot to ask if it was alright to put it on the internet. Perry Street, Mt. Rainier.