Enchanted Highway

 May 31, 2021 - Monday (Memorial Day)

Today was supposed to be a easy day, getting ready to move on tomorrow.  Our only plans were to get our chores done so we could get an early start tomorrow (laundry, vacuuming, dumping tanks, cleaning windshields, etc.)  But when I got up, I started looking at the map again, and I came up with the bright idea that we should drive over past Dickinson to this "Enchanted Highway" we had read about.  It was in the blurb about the old Highway 10 that made it sound like, at least to me, that the Enchanted Highway was part of the Scenic Byway.  

 It's about 40 miles to Dickinson, and the Enchanted Highway started about 10 miles or so past that, and runs for 35 miles.  So it would take a chunk out of our day, but it was doable.  I suggested that to Joe and he got right out of bed (he's always ready for a drive).   This would completely change the tempo of our day -- from leisure to busy.  But by 9:00 we were fueled and on the way.  Joe told me to just take the North Dakota map with us, that way maybe we would stay in this state.  We stopped at the I-95/Hwy 85 restaurant, Trappers, for breakfast.  Their walls were full of mounted animal heads of all the local animals, and traps in all sizes.  Moving on, somewhere on this stretch, out in a field, we saw an antelope with a new baby.  It was so wobbly on its legs that we think today might have been its birthday.  On the eastern edge of Dickinson, we exited I-94 onto what became Hwy 10.  That was about 10:15.  

Just 10 minutes later, we came upon the first metal sculpture, entitled "Geese in Flight.  (You can see this one from I-94.)  These structures are absolutely awesome, much grander and more detailed than we expected, and larger.  

We got off of Hwy 10 and took our pictures.  The write-up said there were pull-offs at each one, so we were good on that. 

X212                                        Geese In Flight    Listed in Guiness Book of World Records as the                                                             world's largest metal structure.

The driveway leading into this sculpture was lined with geese on posts.  The posts were different lengths.

We went back to Hwy 10, our scenic byway, and continued on our way.  This is where I made my mistake, though I didn't realize it at the time.  A few miles later, we came upon another "enchanted" structure, but we didn't know if it was part of the Enchanted Highway structures, it didn't say it was.  But it was pretty neat.  An old farmer was out in the field here planting with an old tractor.  The sign over the entrance said "Heritage Farms," and there was a small log cabin there, in addition to this merry go round, and this other sign.

Moving on, we continuously scanned both sides of the highway, looking for these metal structures.  We also watched for signs that we were still on the Old Red Hwy 10, and the Scenic Byway.  Which we were.  But we were not finding the sculptures.  I kept looking at the map, and could see the names of towns mentioned, but nothing about the structures.

One item of interest was this earthmover.  Joe said he operated ones like this, among other things, in View Nam.

The other item of interest on these extra miles was this windmill with a horse on top.  You have to use your imagination a little for the horse, but we thought Brenda would like it.

 Finally, about noon, I got the map out again, and looked until I located the town where the highway supposedly ended.  And discovered we were on the wrong highway.  And had been for 51 miles!  When we were at the first structure (Geese in Flight), we were supposed to stay on that side road/highway, and not return to the Scenic Hwy 10.  That had not been clear to me!  So we took the next road to get back to I-94, and headed back west.  I was so aggravated at myself for not figuring that out ahead of time.  

Anyhow, we got back to the Geese in Flight.  Just past it was a sign listing the rest of them, and how far it was to them.  Something like this is what I kept looking for on Hwy 10.  But success at last.  We went on to the next sculpture, and the rest of them were on this road.  They were all amazing.  There was a phone number to call for a Talking Trail narrative, which gave history and dimensions of some of the sculptures.  I'm listing that phone number here in case I want to refer to it later.  (701-263-4390, then you just tap in the extension and # sign.)

X213                                        Deer Crossing     The buck is 75 ft. tall and 60 ft. long.

                                            Grasshoppers in the Field

X214  See the little grasshoppers here.  The largest grasshopper stands 60 ft. long, 40 ft. tall.

And the grains of wheat are part of this exhibit, and also line the fence.

Amazing imagination and detail.  This next one, Fisherman's Dreams, was my favorite.  Largest fish is a 70 ft. trout, and it has a fly in its mouth.  This is an underwater scene.

x215        See Joe standing there in the blue shirt (for perspective).  These structures really are HUGE.

x216                                    Pheasants on the Prairie    Rooster is 70 ft. long, 40 ft. tall 

On the way to this one, we were listening to the Talking Trail, and it said we weren't too far from the Pheasant Capital of the World, in Mott, North Dakota, and we might even see one in this area.  About that time, Joe spotted a beautiful, male pheasant in the field right next to the road on his side.  Perfect picture.  I handed Joe the camera, and his finger hit a wrong button and screwed up the camera.  He's cursing, the pheasant is running, and I'm giving up on this photo op!  

X217                                Teddy Rides Again

X218                                I think Joe decided to donate me to this one -- The Tin Family, this was the first of these structures.  World's largest Tin Family Man - 45 ft. tall, Woman - 43 ft. tall, Boy - 23 ft. tall

That was the end of those, but in the town of Regent was the Enchanted Castle with the requisite dragon and knight.  We didn't walk around this one.

I don't know what's with the construction equipment, but today is a holiday, so it obviously wasn't working.

Across the road from this, which was at the end of the town of Regent, was a nice row of lilacs.

That concluded this little adventure, so we headed west toward camp.  We stopped again at Trapper's for an early dinner (3:15).  As we got back to where the National Park parallels the Interstate, we saw a whole herd of buffalo, and several feral horses.  They were obviously on display for the holiday.  Joe said anyone driving through the park probably wasn't seeing any of them today, since they were all out by the highway.

We got back to 4:30, having driven 280 miles today on this little jaunt (100 extra, which cost us about 1 1/2 hours).  We got busy with our chores, I went over to the laundromat while Joe started getting the RV ready to travel.  He came over to help carry the baskets to the jeep and we finally walked down to the river here in the campground (we were going to do this all week.)  This has a nice sandy/pebbly beach.

We just got our chores done, and it started raining.  Then stopped.  Then started again.  This went on for a couple hours, with a little thunder and lightning.  I'm getting used to the sound of raindrops hitting the fiberglass roof of the RV.  We did see half a dozen deer and probably that many antelope today, in addition to the mamma and baby. And that awesome pheasant that we didn't get a picture of.  It's rare that we go for a drive and don't see any antelope.  A good day, even though I screwed it up.  But I was glad to get to see these sculptures we had read about.  They were all pretty special.