9 jun 09

The geographic center of North America is in Rugby ND, right on our route of travel. It's about 50 miles south of the boarder with Canada. Think about it, half of the continent is north of this spot so there is a whole lot of land above the boarder. That helps explain why we are not quite at the half way point for our trip even though I have gone 2240 miles so far.
We met Art in a convenience store. He's a farmer in North Dakota and explained that although their soil is really rich it's not that deep, only about 6 inches. East of here the soil is much deeper. The local crops had been wheat and barley. Now they are planting corn but the seasons have been tough to predict. This year has been much colder than normal. We also talked about motorcycles (Art had an Indian and a Harley) and old cars.
Along US2 we came upon the Big Fish Inn and had to take a photo. Take a look at those teeth!
When we started today the temp was only 38F and it was really foggy. We thought that the fog would break up as the sun came out, which never happened. In fact, we has a light sprinkle and the sun stayed beyond the clouds all day. The high for the day was only 52F.
It's worth mentioning geography now. We have been on US2 across Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and North Dakota. In Michigan this was a 55 mph two lane through swampy forests with very few towns along the way. In Wisconsin the speed was the same and the only change was a few more towns. By the time we got into Minnesota the forests had much larger trees, the speed went to 65mph, and the roads had fewer curves. In North Dakota the road was mainly 4 lanes divided (like the interstate) and the speed limit was 70. Today we made good time and covered 525 miles mostly at 80mph.
We ended up in Willistown ND and got what appears to be the last room to be had in the entire town. It turns out that the Miss North Dakota competition is happening now. Oh well, we are dry, had dinner and a couple beers so life is good. Tomorrow we hope to get across Montana and maybe up into Canada. In a few minutes we will check to see if the passes are open in Glacier National Park.