The North Dakota Badlands.  Everything the South Dakota Badlands have except all those billboards.

The campsite at Buffalo Gap National Grasslands.  Still run by the forest service so I paid the senior access fee....$3 a night.  I slept so well in my little tent.

Heading West

The library performances are going well.  I am back in the swing of things with songs and stories from around the world.  In some cases I picked up the stories from the places I traveled to.  At the Bismarck Public Library, I discovered that Marvia, the children's librarian had retired and the performance area, already the best I've experienced had been improved on even more.  With so many children's activities canceled due to flooding, I had 128 customers, 28 of whom were turned away because of fire regulations.  Some showed up at Mandan that afternoon

The dresses Tisha found for me are perfect.  At first I carefully laid them out in the back, but soon discovered they were indeed wrinkle free.  A quick shake and they are ready to go.

The biggest problem I have with North Dakota cities is their street layouts.  They seem to avoid naming anything for anyone, very egalitarian of them.  Instead, they are all numbered, 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on.  To make it confusing, they are called NE, SW, such as 2nd Street NE.  Then they are intersected with Avenues, also numbered 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on.  I was perpetually lost.  Asking directions just confused me more.

But I headed west on H.94 to the Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  I stopped at the first visitors center and bought what will be my only souvenir, Sibley's guide to western birds, a companion to my eastern guide.  I was already seeing magpies, so I had to be ready.

A tourist came tearing in to report there was a rattlesnake on the trail and somebody had been get over there and get rid of it.  The attendants smiled and sent her on, but told me later that there were always rattlesnakes around and shooing them away would never end.  Hikers have to get smarter.

There was no room at the campground.  The Little Missouri had flooded out all but 29 sites, so I went on to the Buffalo Gap National Grassland campground and hit nirvana.  A lovely campground in a grove of trees at the edge of a creek.  Campground hosts with maps, a connecting trail that runs through the park, running water, flush toilets and heavens above, showers!!!!

I intend to stay there the next three days. All this for the senior citizen rate of $3 a night!

I'll try to post photos tomorrow.  

Through North Dakota

Yesterday, the children's librarian at Devil's Lake Public Library told me that she is a teacher during the school year.  When her school was built it was several miles from the lake.  Now it is 80 feet.  A new school is being built, thanks to a federal grant, but for the next year, there's a levee system going up to protect the building and the students.

"What's happening in Minot is a stroke," she said.  "Devil's Lake is a malignant cancer."

I did the first performance of the tour, which went well, then drove south, but once again, I had to go through the road construction that is shoring up Highway 20.  This slowed me down, but finally I was once again driving 65 miles an hour on state highways and 75 on the interstate.

I love North Dakota dearly, but the drive can be wearing.  Often the off ramps carry the dreaded signs: "No services."  That means no mom and pop restaurants, no gas, no nothing.  Drive on.  North Dakota has beautiful rest stops but the entrance to one of them was flooded.  All along the drive, I found flooded areas.  I suspect there are many frustrated wheat farmers out there.  Will the price of bread go up?

However, the avian population is extremely happy.  I spotted blue herons, white pelicans, redhead ducks, oh so many breeds.  This made me want to stop at some of the reservoirs to bird, but I am not in storytelling mode and had to keep moving.

I finally came to Bismarck and found the KOA campground.  It was pretty much what I expected.  Tenters and RV's were right next to each other.  There was a heated swimming pool which I had no time to use, showers which were welcome, and of course, with the flooding, I was lucky to have a spot to camp at all.
But the noise from the highway and the planes from the airport was deafening.  I pitched my tent for the first time this trip, took a sleep aid, and slept through everything.

I started to take photos of the campground, but thought better of it. Who needs a photo of a hundred RVs?

For the record:  I've driven 971 miles so far, and the good old station wagon is getting over 25 miles per gallon.

I stop daily at a McDonald's for a $1 salad and the use of their wireless system.

The librarians have been sending my fees to Seymour instead of giving me the checks directly as we had agreed.  I find this satisfactory since Gary drops them off at the bank there and I can then access the money with my debit card.

My old Cellcom phone, with no apps whatsoever, does what needs to be done.  I have service everywhere.

Today, performances at Bismarck and Mandan, then it's Theodore Roosevelt National Park for the weekend.

Devil's Lake -- and It Is

I woke up to more rain and other than taking a couple of photos of the Warren Narrows, there was little else to do the rest of the day but drive in rain, rain and more rain. Not what I want in a trip at all. I stopped in Bemidji, Minnesota and Grand Forks, Nebraska to use the any internet access I could find.

I came to my planned stop, Turtle River State Park. I had fond memories of sitting in the rapids with Gary on a hot summer's day, letting the cool water flow over our tired bodies. Instead, I got more cold rain. After thinking it over, I realized I would be sitting in the driver's seat reading and doing sudoku puzzles for three hours if I stayed. I might as well use that time in the driver's seat driving. I consulted the North Dakota map and found another state park south of the city of Devil's Lake, where I was to perform the next day.  So Graham's Island State Park it would be.  I drove toward it.

This tale is about getting up to date maps. My ND map was eight year's old,  but when I was planning this tour, I thought, how much can change in North Dakota?

A lot.  Gary and I were here in the late 1980's or beginning of the 1990's, according to our memories.  Then Devil's Lake was growing a bit, but we were told the level was always going up or down.  It seemed a pleasant enough place to camp.  But as I got close to the city, the lake appeared sooner than I'd expected.  And kept appearing. Sometimes, on both sides of the highway.  

I drove through the city and turned left at the Graham's Island sign.  Almost immediately I hit bad road, the washboard kind.  I kept going because it was a short stretch.  Construction I thought.  Then I hit another, an another, and I began to notice that at these spots, the lake, that old devil, was on both sides of the highway.

I persevered and came to the next island sign and took the left.  Now I was on concrete, but the lake was creeping closer and closer.  The waves were whipping up, tossing water over the causeway, creating foam.  I would have turned back but there wasn't room.  Backing along the curves to the main highway didn't look promising.  I drove forward, figuring I would either reach the island or wind up in the lake. 

Finally, the island loomed.  I was safe, but when I checked in at the bait shop/reservation center, I asked if I could figure the causeway would be open the next day.  Would I be trapped?  I had a performance the next day!

The three young people there laughed.  The island had only been marooned three times so far this summer and only when it got windy so not to worry.  It was windy, but what, me worry?  Jarad, the park ranger, and Lindsey, and Britteny, the park attendants, regaled me with facts and stories.

It seems Devil's Lake has risen 25 feet in the last ten years.  The island used to be connected to the mainland by three roads (shown on my old map, but two are gone as the lake ate away land.  Once upon a time, people used to walk across the lake in two feet a water.  Now the previous bait shop is under fifteen feet of water. One hundred thousand acres of farmland are disappearing every year.  

It was still raining, so I settled in for another night in back of the car.   But in the middle of the night, I woke up and looked out to see stars.  Lots of stars.  The rains were over. 

I woke up to sunshine. My mood improved and I went out to find pickup truck after pickup truck pulling in, each towing a fishing boat.  It seems that Devil's Lake is one of the best walleye fishing spots in the nation.  If they made it in, I could make it out, and so I did, after spending most of the morning drying out and sorting my gear.  Then I headed back down the causeway with only time to take photos of the lake. ;

Of the causeway:

Of closed and disappeared roads:

And of barns in the act of disappearing:

Devil's Lake for sure!

From Williams Narrows

Earlier today, the Bemidji Public Library wireless system didn't allow me to post photos.  This is the point where the Cutfoot Sioux and Winnibigoshish Lakes meet at Williams Narrows.

And this the photo of the lovely resort.

I've been driving in rain all day.  I think of the 24 hours I've been in Minnesota, I've seen three hours without rain and even those were overcast.  Much more of this and I'll have to stop and buy some St. John's wort!

Williams Narrows - Chippewa National Forest - Minnesota

Sometimes it only takes a nap and a walk.

I wandered around Grand Rapids, Minnesota for a couple of hours trying to exercise but finally, enough was enough. It kept on raining. I tried some of the shopping areas, but who wants to walk around Kmart for any length of time? The Grand Rapids library is lovely, but I have enough to books to read on this trip. I tried the Minnesota Historical Society's Forest History Center. The paths looked inviting but it kept on raining. A light mist and I would have been off and trekking, but this was sheeting rain. The visitor's center offered rides through forest demonstrations, but in the rain? I passed on that, too.

So I drove on down Highway 2, then up Highway 46 until the Chippewa National Forest was in range. I took the second campground sign and wound up at Site 13 at the William Narrows Campground at 2:00 pm. Again, only three sites taken plus a camp host, so I had another quiet spot.

But it kept raining. I sat in the driver's seat and caught up on trip paperwork. I read for a while. But it all got old, so I went to my old standby, the power nap. I've noticed in the past that the world is always a sunnier place after a good snooze.

I crawled into the bed in the back of the car. An hour later, I woke up to a strange sound. Silence. No raindrops pounding on the metal roof.

I got up and looked around at the wet world. Dinner would have to be something warm, chili out of a can perhaps. But first, I needed to stretch sore muscles so I went for a walk through the campground and on down the road. I noticed a sign that said “resort”. Well, it wouldn't hurt to investigate. That's how I found the Williams Narrows Resort, that has been here since 1920, run by five generations of the Williams/Karau Family. The same families come here for their vacations year. One group has been coming here for 71 years. As I type this, a half dozen children are playing in the dining room.

Little Chicago it is not. Over the years, the owners have kept going upscale so that now the units are condos. It is a charming place at the spot where the Cutfoot Sioux and Winnibigoshish Lakes connect at the narrows. (Check is out at www.WNResort.com)

I decided to forgo chili out of a can and eat here at the resort. Not only am I eating a great hamburger, I can connect with the internet, check e-mail and even call Gary on my cell phone, because the owners have kept up with technology..

Gary always says I know where to camp and once, again, he is right.

But I will wait to post this until I take photos tomorrow when the sun is shining....I hope. 

   

Wanoka Lake, Chequamagon National Forest

After posting the blog yesterday, I stopped at the Mellon Shell station to use their facilities and to buy water.  While I was at it, I bought a scratch off lottery ticket and won $50!

When I met brother Carl at the Breakwater Restaurant in Ashland for supper, I figured I should pay for the meal. We had a good time catching up.  In my family, everyone thinks whatever I am doing is insane...then they go and do the same thing.  Carl, not learning from my mistakes, ran for Ashland city council and won and now is getting the same kind of results with people coming to the meetings to complain.  Carl is a retired minister and remarked that in his previous occupation, people were always nice to him, so he's not used to the insults.  Like me, he's planning on being on the council for one term only.

Afterwards, Carl showed me the artesian spring at a park at the edge of Lake Superior.  I filled up a gallon jug with water for the campground. 

I camped at Wanoka Lake in the Chequamagon National Forest.  The campground is right off Highway 2 which will lead me to North Dakota.  I didn't need anything but the camping facilities, since I would only be there a night, so I selected a spot farthest away from other campers.  There were only two other campsites filled so that was easy.   The wooded spot was so isolated, I could wash up and change clothes with no observers save for a pileated woodpecker who kept hammering overhead.

I took time to walk around all the loops of the campground to get in some exercise.  I took a look at the 15 acre lake, pretty small but Carl had assured me that trout fisherman have great success there.  There was a small beach, but I was already dressed in cold weather clothes.  No swimming for me this time.

 

This lake was once the site of a Civilian Conservation Corps camp from 1933 to 1942.  There's nothing left of the structures but I think about the young men who once lived here.  So many of them went off to fight in WWII.  Did they come back?  Very few of them are left. They did good work, wherever the CCC went.

With rain forecast, I didn't pitch the tent but crawled in back of the station wagon to sleep on the bed Gary had already late out for me, sweet man.   There was no rain, and I slept solidly through the night.

I got up this morning, started a small fire in the fire pit and started to boil water for morning breakfast when the first rain drops hit.  I threw everything willy-nilly in the car, splashed water on the fire, and made tea at the back of the wagon, taking cover under the raised car door.  Then I set off again.

I took a wrong turn at the entrance and was on a forest road.  I had to drive a ways to find a place to turn around, went over a hill and came upon a black bear, first of the trip.  He was ambling along and at first paid no attention to me.  I looked for the camera but it was underneath all the stuff I'd thrown in the car.  He glanced over his shoulder, shook his head in disgust, and turned into the damp undergrowth. 

Readers will have to take my word for it that he was really there. 

Then it was down Highway 2 for a morning of driving in the rain.

Tonight, the Chippewa National Forest in Minnesota.

The First Day

The first day of any trip is when one finds out that everything was packed in the wrong place or there is too much junk, or not enough.  I am still looking for my vitamins and some writing materials I am sure I brought along.  

The first day is when one should establish good eating habits.  That went by quickly when Gary demanded a farewell breakfast of eggs, bacon and fried potatoes.  I left with a belly full of grease.  It was good though. I made up for it in Phillips with a broccoli-cauliflower salad lunch.

The beginning of a trip is when you start an exercise regimen.  So far, I stopped at the Wisconsin Concrete Forest south of Philips to hike the nature trail, only half a mile,but that's a start. I'll try to walk the rails-to-trails section in Ashland.

The Concrete Forest was constructed by a retired logger named Fred Smith.  He worked on it for about fifteen years starting around 1950.  I think it was folksinger Skip Jones who told me about coming back from a gig in pea soup fog and pulling off the road to sleep until sunrise.  He woke up to see the fog lifting and these strange figures emerging.  

That would weird anyone out. 

Right now, I'm in the Phillips library. Nothing much new on this first day, Gary and I have camped in the area before. I'll meet my brother and his wife for supper then it's on to the campground.,

Tomorrow it's Minnesota, back roads, small towns and adventures.

Packed!

It's been raining all day.  Every so often the rain  let up a bit then Gary and I dashed out to the car, which is sitting in the driveway, with another basket or container with clothes, camping gear, maps, paperwork.

This was a haphazard way to pack, so I will probably be re-organizing for a week.

After thinking about the flooding in North Dakota, I decided to call Fort Abraham Lincoln State Park in Mandan to see how things stood there.   They stood under six feet of Missouri water, I was told, so I won't be camping there.  The attendant suggested the KOA campground which is on higher ground.  I am not a fan of KOAs, but with the flooding and a big softball tournament in Bismarck, I decided I wouldn't be choosy.  I made a reservation and now have a place to stay four days from now.

Tomorrow, I leave at 10:00 a.m.  I'll meet my brother Carl and his wife Sue in Ashland for dinner, then will drive on to the campground on Lake Wakonta.  With rain forecast, I will likely be sleeping in the station wagon.

So it begins.  Tonight will be my last night in a bed for some time.