This is a true story. The events depicted took place in North Dakota in 2022. At the request of the survivors, (only our names are used). Out of respect for the dead, the rest has been told exactly as it occurred.
North Dakota is known as the state that people visit only to complete visiting all 50 states. The state tourism department has capitalized on this. They even have a "Best for Last" club to celebrate those who finish this goal with North Dakota being last. All you have to do to join is to check in with a state visitor's center and let them know North Dakota is your 50th state to visit. They'll give you a certificate, add you to the list, and some centers give you a T-shirt. It's not our 50th. We still have some northeastern states, Hawaii, and Alaska to go. This was just the northern route to get from Mississippi to Washington via Kentucky, and we hadn't taken it before. There are specific things we want to do in Minnesota and Wisconsin, so we'll be back to those and just drove through this trip. With the difficulty I had finding things to do in North Dakota, it looked like a one and done kind of state. I chose this northern route through North Dakota specifically because we were in a hurry to get home, and I couldn't find many stops worth making, so it should be much faster to get through North Dakota than South Dakota. (Bruce laughs and says, rightly, that we haven't made it through South Dakota in less than three days so far, and I still have things I want to see there! It's only about 400 miles end to end!) I searched Tripadvisor, Viator, Google, and even asked in some travel groups. All I got was Theodore Roosevelt National Park and the wood chipper in Fargo. Even Minot, one of the infamous Cold War missile storage/launch sites, can't be toured. Long ago, I dated a guy who was stationed in Minot. He talked about reading while driving because the roads were straight and you never saw anybody else on them! (We didn't try that, but I don't doubt he did it!)
So, into the Fargo-Moorehead Visitor's Center we went.
The Walk of Fame is full of celebrities that have visited North Dakota. I was pretty sure Aerosmith was NOT from North Dakota. When I got home and looked up what celebrities were from ND, I understood why they had to expand the criteria to those who had visited the state!
I loved the movie, "Fargo", and watched it several times. Liked the series, and am waiting for the next season to drop. The wood chipper is so famous, that they have a small replica on the lawn and the one from the movie inside. We had fun playing with it. It has a socked foot sticking up in it and a wood block laying to the side. In the film, Peter Stormare uses the wood block to apparently stuff Steve Buscemi's character into the wood chipper. Peter Stormare is much taller than either of us, so we had to just use our hands.
After checking out all of the Fargo memorabilia, we scoured the shelves for things to do along the road while driving through North Dakota. Most things were about multi-day hunting/fishing trips, water sports, or winter skiing, all of those things that require time we didn't have this trip. There was one little brochure that showed a few stops along the way, so we made that our road map. We weren't interested in shopping and didn't have time for hiking, hunting, fishing, or a bunch of small museums, so we grabbed the highlights.
First stop was Jamestown, ND. This town has two claims. It is the site of the world's largest buffalo statue and the birthplace of Louis L'Amour. We are suckers for those kitschy roadside attractions, so we had to stop and see the buffalo. He is 26 feet tall and made of concrete over a wire frame. He lives at the end of the little recreated western town on Louis L'Amour Lane.
The recreated western town boasts replicas of many types of old-time buildings and other fun little things. There's a reason why Bruce didn't have a Wanted poster! (I, on the other hand, was smart enough to not get captured!) If you called ahead, you could even hire a stagecoach ride! I found buffalo berry jam in the gift shop. After bringing it home and tasting it, I wasn't very impressed. It probably won't get eaten. It wasn't bad, but it was kind of bland.
The next stop was Salem, ND, where we got to meet Salem Sue. Sue is the world's largest Holstein cow, and she was erected in honor of the local dairy industry. The local high school uses the Holstein as their mascot, though it appears to be a different Holstein than Sue. She is 38 feet tall and 50 feet long. She even has all the veins and cloven hooves. I'm just glad I never had to milk such a big cow! My grandmother had her favorite "pepper cow", which was a Holstein with mostly tiny spots that looked like she was dotted with pepper, almost a roan color. Most of the milking cows looked more like Sue. They bred their cows for slaughter or sale. They didn't have a milking operation, but Papaw always kept one for actually milking since he drank raw milk instead of that "new-fangled, pasteurized stuff." He lived a long, long life.
The next and next to last thing on our list was a series of stops. It was on the brochure we got in Fargo, but Bruce remembered it as one of the drives we had heard about a few years ago and wanted to do eventually. It is the Enchanted Highway, a 32-mile long stretch of mostly unnamed road from Interstate 94 to Main Street in the town of Regent. Part of the road appears to be named 100-1/2 Ave SW. Google Street View calls it 102 Ave SW. Along this stretch of road, a sculptor has erected eight huge scrap metal sculptures in small plots of land on either side. The first one, "Geese in Flight," is just off the interstate. You can easily see it before pulling off.
Deer Crossing
Grasshoppers in the Field
Fisherman's Dream
Pheasants on the Prairie
Teddy Rides Again
At the other end of town, follow Main Street when it forks off of 102-1/2 Ave SW. At the end of Main Street is the Enchanted Castle. This was previously a school building, but the same man who made the sculptures converted it into a hotel, tavern, and restaurant. In front of the hotel is another sculpture of a knight fighting a dragon, and castle wall structures have been erected in front of the school with a wooden drawbridge overlaying a "moat" of blue-painted rocks. It is absolutely adorable! The interior has many suits of armor.
We decided to eat at the Excalibur restaurant. We had large rib eye steaks with a cluster of snow crab legs and some shrimp, a seasoned succotash, a salad, and warm bread. It was reasonably priced for the serving size. We were expecting an okay meal, given that most of these kitschy places are more for the "kitsch" and less for the taste of the food. We were pleasantly surprised, though. The food was DELICIOUS! (I was hungry, so there are no pix of the food!) I was sorry that I had already booked us a nonrefundable room in Dickinson. I would have liked to have stayed at the castle. The rooms seemed comfortable, and the rates were reasonable.
I guess North Dakota had more than what was expected, but it's still a one-and-done kind of state. Based on the write-ups, none of the museums and other potential stops had anything particularly unique. From the time I took the first picture until checking into the hotel in Dickinson was 8-1/2 hours. That's pretty much got North Dakota except for Teddy Roosevelt National Park. If we come back, it would only be to drive through or for hunting, fishing, or water sports, and there still isn't anything else terribly unique found there that can't be found elsewhere.
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