Day five - North AND South Dakota!

North Dakota has its own beauty.  Blue blue skies, with white clouds that could be drawn by a child on construction paper!  We saw lovely ponds along the road, blue as the sky, surrounded by beautiful tall grasses and fields with golden trees and grasses and that black dirt.  On the Garmin screen, the ponds are shown, looking like a Giant scattered them with a very large hand - thanks, God - they're beautiful!

Trees are in the distance, around homes or at the edge of the fields.  Stopped in Michigan, ND (!) for breakfast, where 'blueberry pancakes' means plain pancakes with blueberry syrup!  Where they sell something called "koozies", which turns out to be what I might call a "cozy" for your beer, and ice cream called "squish cones'.  Friendly people, huge breakfast - Dan, skinny thing that he is, has a hollow leg - that's the only way I can understand how he can eat like he does and look like he does!  We set the Garmin for Minot, ND (pronounced like "why not"), and Gladys (Dan's name for the Garmin) said we should turn in 150 miles....!!

More impressions of ND: Gargantuan grain elevators, with mile-long trains lined up waiting to be filled; trucks with 5th wheel trailers AND a boat behind;,  colors are golds and greens(rarely any of the reds and oranges we see in Michigan and Wisconsin); fields of (now) dying sunflowers as far as you can see; huge 1-ton size bales of hay, in fields and even on the road right-of-ways; one hillside of green and red grasses with black Angus cattle; combines and other farming gear, sized for these enormous fields; large (hundreds) groups of windmills (note, ginormous!), blades slowly turning, with normal farming activity happening on the ground.  Once on US-83, south of Minot, the terrain turned to more rolling hills as we approached the Missouri River.  We went through Bismark, the capitol of N.Dak, and ate at the Space Alien (Earthlings welcome). We passed a huge coal-fired generating plant, that had a 4 mile (!) conveyor belt for the coal that stretched across the highway in a large black tube.
On US-2 today, passed Grand Forks, Larrimore, Michigan, Devil's Lake, Rugby (geographic center of North America), and Minot.  (more narrative past the pictures)

Alien Planet Restaurant in Bismark, ND

view from CCC shelter, Turtle River, ND

CCC shelter in Turtle River State Park, ND

an Ash tree (ND is concerned about emerald bore)

Michigan, ND (who knew?)

More from Michigan, ND!

I just loved this spot

pretty church in historic village in ND

central spot in North America (Rugby, ND)

Why are the telephone poles so short in ND??

thousands of these in North and South Dakota

At Minot, we're turning away from Hwy 2 for a while to go south On US-83 to the Black Hills, Mt. Rushmore, Wind Cave National Park and other attractions.  We're going to park the truck/camper in Rapid City, South Dakota, and tour the area in my car, returning at night to our camper home.
Tonight (Friday) we are one of two campers in what has to be one of the most beautiful spots in this part of the world.  Lake Oahe, near Mobridge, South Dakota - the campground is on a sort of peninsula, so every campsite is lakeside.  New-looking bath house - had a wonderful, long hot shower.  I'll get some spectacular pictures in the morning!