Tuesday, June 4, 2004

Jamestown, ND

Today was a full day.  

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 June 2-3, 2024

Sunday and Monday

Sunday was a day off.  It was raining when we got up, and rained off and on all morning, but then cleared off in the afternoon.  We didn't even set foot out of the RV until 5:00 p.m., when Joe decided to check the air pressure in the new tires .  And check the oil.  Both were fine.  But once he went outside, he decided we needed to do something, so we drove over to a restaurant and had dinner, then he took me to a casino (Northern Lights Casino, how could I resist that).  No winner here.  We saw one deer on our drive to the casino, and something, maybe a groundhog, on the way back.  No pictures today.  It rained again on this drive. Moving on tomorrow into North Dakota on our way to Medora to see the Medora Musical, and drive through Theodore Roosevelt National Park again.  We have reservations there on Friday, so we will be taking our time.

Monday, we got a late start heading to North Dakota. It rained lightly during most of the night but had stopped this morning.  We looked at the map again and made some more reservations for the future.  By the time we dumped and took on water, which took forever, it was just about noon.  We headed back to Walker and I finally got a picture of this fishing bobber that we had passed twice before.  This is just before Walker.  On this stretch, we saw a turkey (finally) and a groundhog (woodchuck).  And hit another bird -- I think that's 4 this trip.

Minnesota and America's Northwoods are home to many towering Paul Bunyon statues.  We had seen one in Bemidji on our last trip, but today we passed this one in Akeley, touted as the only one where Bunyon has dropped to one knee, inviting visitors to perch in his mighty palm, a perfect place to sit for a souvenir snapshot.  We didn't really stop, but Joe pulled over long enough for me to get a photo.

The only other photo I took was when we crossed the state line into North Dakota, about 3:20.  We thought we would change time zones today but apparently we have to go further west before we hit the time zone change.  We skirted around most of Fargo on the interstate, but it did look like a nice, clean city.

We drove 227 miles today, further than we expected.  Had one small detour, but otherwise it was a nice, uneventful drive, first through forests, then through flat, farmland.  North Dakota does not appear to have as many lakes as Minnesota did. We fueled outside of Fargo for $3.199, which was a little better than back at Walker.  

We got to our campground, another Corp of Engineers one, just about 5:00.  We had a reservation for site 29 so we could go directly to our campsite.  So we unhooked the Jeep, moved a picnic table out of the way, and Joe got ready to back in.  I parked the Jeep in the spot next to ours (28) and accidentally noticed that our name was on the tag for this one, not the next one.  So I got Joe stopped, and he then backed up to this one, and we called the reservation line and told them our dilemma.  They checked and said 29 was the right spot, so Joe pulled up to that one again, and we got parked.  Spot 29 was tagged with another name but that reservation doesn't start until the day we leave, so they must have just have just mixed up the site numbers.  So far, no one has come by to question us or leave us parking tags, but Joe did see a ranger drive through while ago so we must be ok.

We are here for 3 nights, so we have some new territory to explore, and new dirt roads to drive.  Jamestown is the next town and it appears to have some things to see, that that will be tomorrow's agenda.

June 1, 2024

Leech Lake, Minnesota

Today is our great granddaughter Kallie Jo's 6-month birthday, so happy birthday to her.  She is wanting to crawl so badly, so I hope today is the day.

We are staying at the Leech Lake Dam Recreation Area on Leech River.  This river is huge, and is the Muskie capital of the world.

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There is a lot of power in that water coming through the dam.  And there are a lot of boats in the campground, so we assume this is a big fishing lake.

We have also seen several of these "ice house" campers here -- they pull them out onto the frozen lakes and there are holes in the floor on the inside that they can drop their lines through.  We got to look inside one when we were in Minnesota the last time.

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After our quiet evening last night, today we thought we should look over the area somewhat, so after breakfast we took a "loop" drive into the town of Walker.  Joe had looked up things to do in Walker and it mentioned a Farmers Market on Thursdays and Saturdays, but another article said that had been changed to some kind of "green scene."   So we checked that out, but unfortunately it had been changed to a restaurant, so we just drove on by.  Perhaps it is a farmer's market later in the season.

 As we came into town, we found out that there was a walleye tournament going on, and we saw several boats on the lake.  We didn't see any boats coming in with fish, unfortunately.

We saw this goose family swimming in the lake.  It's very interesting that they always protect their babies by keeping them between the parents.  We have seen this a few times.

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They had a great dock in town, so we checked it out, and the marina beside it.  

Look how clear this water is.  We saw some minnows but no big fish from the dock.

We saw a couple fishing boats on the lake, this one was on the move.  The water was a bit choppy so we don't know how the fishing was.

And this one was of a family getting ready to go out.  I don't think they were fishing, but who knows.

This map shows how big this lake is, and the many fingers that shoot off of it.  From this town, our campground is almost directly across it.

In front of the museum is a monument entitled "Circle of Life" that is quite interesting.  There are 12 statues representing different times and what was going on at that time.  

We made a stop at the grocery store, the first real one that I been in for a while.  We filled up the refrigerator, so I guess I have to start cooking again.

As we headed back to the campground, Joe found one side road loop in the Chippewa National Forest that he thought we should check out.  But we didn't find anything of interest there.

Continuing on our way around the loop back to the campground, we passed this huge fish, a roadside attraction just west of Bena, MN.  It is a 65-foot long wooden structure in the form of a muskie.  It was built as a drive-in restaurant in 1958 but only operated a few years as a restaurant.  The Big Fish Supper Club, located next to the fish-shaped building, was opened in 1972.   

We got back to the RV mid-afternoon, in time for me to watch the Diamondbacks finally win a baseball game.  After dinner, we drove the trash to the dumpster and took a short, 45-minute drive around the countryside, but did not see any wildlife -- except a hawk.  Seemed like a perfect area for deer and turkey but nothing showed.

It was a beautiful day here, 71 I think.  Tomorrow is supposed to be 75, then rain on Monday.  The natives here are loving this nice weather -- I think they were all ready for winter to be over.