Friday, September 15, 2023: Any bike ride that starts from Barelas Coffee House is a good ride.

We saw only one famous/infamous local/state politician, and the late Bill Richardson wasn’t there, but the wait staff and food are the real stars at BCH, and they both didn’t disappoint. The food and atmosphere also served as perfect attitudinal appetizer for a ride into Los Candelarias y Griegos in the near/mid-North Valley. Here’s the map gist of the visit:

Outsiders don’t cycle much in most of these neighborhoods, for it features/is marred by (depending on how you look at it) a great many dead-end residential streets. Folks in lycra racking up miles don’t care much for streets like Valle Alto Court NW that quickly end at acequias or Valley High School, but for slow ride wandering, they are perfect.

And there were many such perfect street-lettes, with names like San Clemente Ave. and Pedroncelli Court, reflecting the mix of cultures formulating and reformulating some of the history of these historic neighborhoods.

The flat-as-a-Barelas Coffee House tortilla geography is another feature of this part of town, and between the riding ease and relaxed surroundings, one can’t help but becoming more and more relaxed despite the fact they are actually “exercising.” Thus, these North Valley neighborhoods achieve optimal slow riding impact, which is frankly much more about mental health than physical.

There’s also long-standing and new “bike infrastructure,” such as the multi-use path above running along a ditch that I call “a ditch” (because I don’t know the name of it) and, in this stretch, Garfield Middle School. I worked for a semester at Garfield, and must admit that my riding by it is always good but especially good when I’ve successfully left it behind. Today’s bollard configuration was enhanced by the kids’ dress shirt, one that definitely went to a wedding and/or confirmation before serving in its current role.

After wandering about for an hour or so around Valley HS, a few streets stuck out for both their languid nature and status as relative “throughway” in the area:

• Grande Dr. NW (always a favorite)
• Las Tomases Dr. NW
• San Isidro St. NW
• Cherokee NW

These streets are already “bike boulevards” in all but official designation, yet I don’t even know if they are considered “bike routes.” Given ABQ has so many same named streets popping up in various part of town, Las Tomases for instance, one stretch of a street might be a glorified alley while another is a bit higher on the stress meter. Claremont is a good example of this throughout town; if you ridden it’s more widely ridden stretches, try its western terminus west of 4th St sometime. A gloriously alley-like dead-end.

Ambling up to Greigos NW, the ride turned west into neighborhoods along Rio Grande Blvd. Helping the slow riding vibes both here and throughout the ride was a general lack of barking dogs and ZERO unfenced dogs. This might be the biggest difference between ABQ’s North Valley and my South Valley. The fencing in the North Valley is quite a bit better, keeping one’s heart rate in “Zone 1” for the duration unlike the common sudden heart rate spikes that come with South Valley residential street forays.

Finishing up along Candelaria west of Rio Grande Blvd., the neighborhood gets pricier and the little libraries a bit artier and pronouncement-heavy, as above. It’s still a nice ride, one shared now with many cyclists as it connects with the Bosque Path at the Nature Center. As one connecting thus myself, it was both interesting and striking that my North Valley slow ride vibe was actually disrupted when I hit the Bosque Path, a multi-use path along a river/ditch. The Bosque Path is much higher stress than Valle Alto Court NW.

Not to be too arty and/or pronouncement-heavy, this finding encompasses what this blog is now all about: Finding and reporting on slow riding cycling options away from the madding crowd of what is typically considered “low stress cycling.” While Bosque Path, NDC, etc., have their charms, what might be the Better cycling parts of Burque are found in its neighborhoods on dead-end streets that “go nowhere.”

Go nowhere. That’s a pronouncement worth following.