A nn Arbor
Road Closed means relaxed skate touring
Sidewalk Tour, Skate Travel Journals
August 2010
to Surface Motion Skate Tour
Sidewalk Tour August 2010
Intro
Overloaded tour plans: SC CA
Aug 9 3 PM
Rte to lost sta: SF CA
Aug 9 7 PM
Limbo in foud sta: SF CA
Aug 10 3 AM
Hitch in prfct ride: Scrmnto CA
Aug 10 9:30 AM
Photo ops Nev stops: Lvelck NV
Aug 11 8:30 AM
Co and Denvr revisted: Denver CO
Aug 11 2:30 PM
Sights in Nebrska: N Platte NE
Aug 11 4 PM
Obstcl to food: Lexington NE
Aug 12 2 AM
Emrgng fr west: Dvnprt IA
Aug 12 9 AM
Gary didn't hold still: Gary IN
Aug 12 10 AM
Bottl egg & lndmks: Btn Harb IN
Aug 16
Optimistic sign: Ann Arbr MI
Aug 17 12:30 AM
Lt nght touring: Ann Arbr MI
Aug 17 4 AM
Endurance test: Ann Arbr MI
Aug 17 11 AM
Seeds of doubt: Ann Arbr MI
Sidewalk Tour Feb-Mar 2010
Sidewalk Tour 2009
Tour Inventory 2009
Backpacks
Clothes
Gear
Boards
Phone/PDA
Mobile blogging
Northwest: June 2009
South: Mar-Apr 2009
East: March 2009
Bridge Skate Training
Oct 08-Mar 09
August 16 - 17, 2010: Interesting sidewalk courses, textures, and angles
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Monday, August 16, 2010 - An optimistic sign: Road Closed
Pylons mark improvised slalom course, Ann Arbor, MI
8.16 5 PM While looking for lodgings in Ann Arbor I walked past the bus station on Huron toward the U Mich campus, looking for good sidewalk terrain, maybe one with tree roots making some nice pushed up sidewalk bumps, always a fun ride, and shaded with wavelike overhanging boughs. I spotted just such a possibility, a tree lined street detouring away from Huron, State St. This led to a fine discovery, as after a couple blocks coasting along the sidewalk, I came to the longboard tourist's dream, a detour sign and fence roadblock meaning no cars, and a freshly paved road accessible to a skateboarder. Not only was it going to be some nice pavement, the trees and houses alongside looked like they would be some nice landscape to either side of my ride.
What topped off the longboard tour perfection was the presence of a pattern of large rubber cones to direct traffic, which gave me some targets for my weaving carving tour style.
State St. blocked to vehicle traffic
State St. was on a slight incline, so the first pass went perfectly. I wove down for several blocks, carving back and forth using the whole street, drawing a pattern around the big pylons.
Farther down, the section of road under construction came to an end with another roadblock temporary fence across the road. I skated past it onto a section that had the original surface, a reddish cobblestone paving.
The other end of the road closed section
Brick building and red purple cobbled bottom of the hill
I clattered along and carved a bit, but it wasn't nearly as fun, because the road wasn't closed and cars kept coming up the hill. I looked at a few brick buildings that matched the cobblestones pretty well, then walked back up to the road closed pylon section.
As I skated uphill I paused frequently to take pictures. On either side were the wooden siding, big porches, bay windows, attic windows under steep a frames, towers, turrets, and other features seen in older neighborhoods in the North Eastern US.
A for rent sign among a fairly heavy growth of trees in front of a green porch invited me to stay a long while so I could explore the cobblestone, fresh and old pavements in the neighborhood.
House on the cobble section of road, for rent
At an intersection it was possible to see where the fresh pavement abutted the old asphalt, in a jagged bump that looked like a berm on the beach. It defined the course of the traversing as did the pylons, and I skated up to it as close as possible, in a big frontside carve.
Berm shaped meeting of fresh and old pavement
The pylons plotted a course in front of an intricate brick building, a church perhaps, with several keyhole shaped porches and portals.
An intricate brick building
A couple of the houses looked like fraternities, which turned out to be collective houses for students or groups of post grads.
Blue collective house with porch swing
The backhoes and paving vehicles were parked near the roadblock. One truck had an arm that curled delicately at rest, as if naturally wanting to cradle something in the crook of its claw. I walked until a door of a house was aligned, and shot the door cradled in the paving cat's arm.
A cat cradles a State Street doorway
Tuesday, August 17, 2010 - Late night touring on U Mich campus
12:30 AM Greyhound station, Ann Arbor. I didn't have much luck finding a cheap place to stay. It didn't seem worth spending a lot of money on a hotel, since I was well rested from staying at my friend's and it seemed like Ann Arbor would be a fairly easy place to stay out all night. I gave some thought to leaving anyway, since I had accomplished my goal of finding a good sidewalk tour street.
At one point I tried to catch the bus back to Detroit, but since the bus station was closed it was impossible to get a ticket. When the bus came the driver wouldn't let me pay on the bus, and so I was stuck in Ann Arbor. The decision was made for me, I guess, although I was ready for a night out skating. I skated and walked uphill up Huron, the road I'd taken to find the pylon course earlier that day. This time I branched off on State St in the other direction, toward the University of Michigan campus.
1 AM U Mich square. The guidebook mentioned a diagonal walkway on campus and that sounded like a pretty cool sidewalk tour idea. I crossed State St onto a large square of lawn and park, which could be walked or ridden down a diagonal walkway from corner to corner.
I skated down the diagonal, and there was a slight hill, or it was so smooth that a couple of pushes carried me a vast distance down it. The path was practically deserted, as school hadn't quite started. Around the square were libraries, research labs, and dormitories. There were incandescent lamps that put out white light, but lines of red brick trim gave the diagonal a reddish cast. Rough hewn stone benches were set here and there.
Diagonal walkway, University of Michigan campus
There was an archway at the end that looked mideival, as if that part of U Mich were a monastery.
Archway at end of diagonal, U Mich
Archway at end of diagonal, U Mich
Tuesday, August 17, 2010 - Endurance test at the Freezewood
4 AM I spent some time along the strip of bars and eateries on the street past the archway, hanging out in a bar called the Brown Jug until close, then skated all the way across town toward the bus station where I'd been told there was an all night diner called the Fleetwood, where late night Arborians inevitably gravitated. A few blocks off Main St. I found the diner, a metal sided one story shack or railroad car with a cafe awning added.
The diner wasn't the most comfortable place to while away the hours. Bus stations that stay open all night, such as the ones in Sacramento and Memphis, have in the past proven fairly comfortable, if a bit boring. The Fleetwood Diner seemed set up to discourage all night patronage, not encourage it. The back corner looked inviting in that there were tables that looked like reading could be done, and I even spied an outlet for my power hungry laptop. No one sat at any of these tables, and as soon as I sat down I realized why. I read some of the graphic novel I'd bought for HW's collection of comics and realized that I wasn't going to be able to sit here very long, nowhere near the marathon hours I'd sat in one place during other tour all nighters.
The air was on and it was astoundingly cold, although it was mild outside. I put on my fleece jacket and wished I'd brought my second jacket, the shell. My potatoes and eggs were chilled instantly, and the coffee lasted not much longer. The waiter came over to top off my cup, and I asked him if he could empty it and start a whole new one, which he politely did.
It wasn't tempting to sit outside in the mild night air, because a cadre of utterly destitute homeless men hovered around the outdoor seating. Finally I couldn't take the cold anymore and sat outside and endured the stories and pleas of a couple of the men for a brief period of time, before I headed inside for a last cup. I moved to the counter which was near enough to the grill to offset the frigid AC.
5 AM I left the Freezewood before dawn, skated up Main a ways and down Liberty to State, then rode down the Diag back to the archway. Past the archway there was a little square and to the left a wide path running a long ways up, forming a 45 degree angle with the diagonal. I was fueled from all the food and coffee, and made several skate passes down it. I rolled down the path, onto the street, and a couple blocks down, all downhill. Then I walked back up hundreds of yards and did it again.
A distance up the walkway I chanced upon the sort of construction vehicle that I started photographing in Tulsa and Nashville on my last tours in the spring. I didn't expect to find a tree trimming truck here. It was the same sort of cherry picker basket and arm that I'd seen in Gary, and had blown the chance to photograph. There was no bus to take me away from this one, and this rig wasn't going anywhere for hours. The only challenge was how to light it. I tried some shots with the flash, high sensitivity settings, and with very long exposure times.
Cherry picker on campus walkway at night, Ann Arbor, MI
Tree trimming truck on lit walkway at night, U Mich
Cherry picker ready for tree trimming, U Mich
Before the sun came up I made another traverse of the Diag. There was a dome structure that was lit from within. It looked like a large lamp. I tried a few shots of the dome surrounded by darkness, then added a couple more with some flash so the lawn could be seen in front.
Dome lit up, U Mich
Tuesday, August 17, 2010 - From Ann Arbor trees fall seeds of doubt
11 AM Borders bookstore and cafe, Liberty St. It was a long night but there had been many long nights waiting for daylight on these travels. I had waited overnight at the Memphis bus station, left the Denver bus station three times in one night trying to get home, and each late night layover at the Sacramento station seemed extended due to delays. Outside of the bus stations there were many other tests of endurance and patience.
Apparently there was some symbolism in the cherry pickers I'd seen in Gary Indiana and abandoned on the U Mich campus walkway. The arbors of Ann that needed trimming were laden with the seeds of doubt. It was in those hours on the diagonal and square walkways of University of Michigan that I began to seriously ponder the Sidewalk Tour project. It was always difficult to enter strange towns, look for budget lodgings, and skate around looking for interesting sidewalks from a skating and visual perspective. Ann Arbor was no exception. And yet, on this side trip during the Detroit visit, hard and frustrating as it was, it hit me that the sidewalk tour process was getting too easy.
I thought about San Francisco and I how I hadn't got the pictures when I was walking up Fourth St from the Caltrain to the Greyhound station when the pedestrian traffic was acting so weird. It left a hole in the record of the trip. I dropped the ball. It was easy to lose focus on the project and miss important opportunities while simply going about my business. I maintained that focus in Ann Arbor, but I was thinking about how it would be nice to travel and skate around and not have to be so restricted by documenting it.
Later on I told my Detroit friends how it was now coming up on two years that I had begun obsessively documenting my skateboard excursions, and now as I had continually failed to really master the art of budget longboard touring, always running up against unexpected difficulties, at the same time the whole process seemed to be losing its challenge. It's one thing to be a traveling journalist or artist and to go on visiting new places, making images with camera, words, and pencil sketches. It's another thing to be a skateboarder and surfer and to go on looking for ways to be creative with skating and boarding.
I was mastering the sidewalk skating and photography process but I kept longing to do something more technical and innovative from the skateboarding side. My usual procedure with Surface Motion projects was to work on something for a year or so, document it, then move on.
I felt I still needed to do more documentation, since I hadn't written much about my skate touring techniques for physical endurance, mental endurance, speed control, and traffic safety. That could be added later. But Ann Arbor was the place where I thought about ending the project, or seriously changing its direction.
