BOB CORBETT'S FOREST PARK JOURNALS

Two rainy days in Forest Park

July 18, 2005
By Bob Corbett

About a week ago, shortly after Hurricane Dennis hit Florida and the rains drifted up here, we had a rainy morning. I woke early and decided this was the time to try out my new rain coat. I’m taking a 7 week exploratory trip to Central America in Oct/Nov. and (just headed off alone to see what I find in Central America, with a back pack on my back) had purchased a very light weight rain coat. I’ll be there in the hot/rainy season and it will rain some nearly every day.

At 6:40 AM I was on Tamm Ave., heading for the park. I walked down Tamm and over the Tamm Ave. bridge, and turned up toward Hi-Pointe. Then down Skinker a bit to the trail that cuts in toward the Art Museum. It was a lovely morning the rain falling steadily, a slight breeze so I needed the hood up tight. The coat was getting a good test.

The park is very soft in the rains, and few people. Just off Skinker, about 30-40 yards off the road there is a prairie area with a football-field sized area with 3-4 ft. tall flowering plants. Lots of wildlife in that area. I was walking there and a woman came along walking her dog. I asked her if she had ever seen the foxes that are supposed to hang out in this area, and which I have never seen. She said yes. She’s seen them several times since she walks early in the morning, around 5:30 – 6 AM.

Well, that was all I needed, I was sloshing around in those high bushes, getting very muddy, but having a ball. Still, no fox sighting for me.

The jacket works quite well.

Today was a crazy day. I had no intention at all of riding my bike in the rain. Lately I have been riding in the heat and humidity of the day. The Tour de France is on and most days the coverage begins between 6:30 and 8:30 AM. It is over about 10:30, and by the time I get out of the house it is near;y 11 and very hot.

Today was rest day for the tour, so I was up and out early. I had a crazy day planned with my ride to be in four sections:

• Through the park to the Central West End and then sitting a long time at the Bread Company and reading. That I did.
  
  
• Next I planned to ride back through the park, finishing all but 8 miles of my ride, but to go home and drop my book and note pad.
  
  That’s when the fun began. I went a back route home, over behind the Art Museum, and as I was coming through that same prairie area where I’d been last week in the rain, it began to rain very suddenly today! It was coming hard, so I got under a tree to shield me and my book, note pad and bike. I had no rain gear with me, the weather forecast said it wouldn’t rain until tonight.
  
  As I was standing there in this extremely remote area under a tree, a woman came walking along in a bright yellow rain coat and she was very cheery. She asked if I were stuck and I said only until it lets up. Not more that 50 yards away I could see a bus stop and shelter, but it was raining hard and I was fairly dry under the tree.
  
  She walked on, comfortable in her rain gear – so it seemed.
  
  In a few minutes the rain lessened and I hurried over to join others in the bus shelter. About 10 minutes later the woman I had talked with came along and into the bus shelter to tell me she was soaked to the skin, the new rain coat she had purchased wasn’t worth a damn. I had a good laugh with her.
  
  
• The third and fourth parts of my plans for today’s ride were the same, just done twice. I had two very heavy boxes of books to mail to a friend of mine. By the time I got home the rain was gone, the sun was out and it was getting hot, already after 9 AM.
  
  I changed into dry clothes and put my rain coat in my basket. Then I took the lighter of the two boxes and secured it to my bike with a bungee cord and headed off. Well, I didn’t need a rain coat – well maybe I did. It seemed to be rained from the ground up!!! As I rode up Clayton Ave., heading toward the Richmond Heights post office on Big Bend the sun was hot, and the humidity must have been 100%. It felt as though water was coming up from the damp pavement like the light rain I rode home in. I could feel it on my legs.
  
  I made it to the post office with no trouble, rode over to the Esquire Schnucks, got some groceries and headed home. This time I dropped my rain coat inside, got the second box, it turned out to be 23 lbs!!! and secured it to the bike and went back to the post office and back to Schnucks for even more groceries.

All in all what I thought would be a 15 mile trip from beginning to end turned out to be 19 miles. No matter it was so much fun and Forest Park is as lovely as ever in the rain. Very different. Obviously there are fewer people, though I was surprised by just how many walkers and joggers didn’t care a thing about the rain (there was no lightening in this early morning rain), but the bikers and roller bladers were absent.

A lovely soft day.

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