Central Dakota Steam Threshers Reunion

Today we drove to New Rockford, North Dakota to see   steam engines and a demonstration of threshing grain. It was very impressive.  I have never seen this many running steam engines at one time before.  There was an operating saw mill and a corn shucking mill.  There was a washing machine demonstration including a wash board.  Lots of old tractors and old time farm equipment.

                                           

                                                      

                                                       

                                      

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We have spent the last few days in Jamestown, ND visiting our granddaughter Brittany. She lives and works here in Jamestown. I was going to take a picture of her but she got away before I could.  I’ll get a picture next time.  But here is a picture of her holding this buffalo up.  Jamestown is known for having the largest buffalo.  There are 3 albino buffalo located here tho we have not been lucky enough to see them.

                                                              

Recap of our Alaska Trip

Now that we are back in the lower 48, I’ll do a recap of our trip.  We left Malmstrom AFB, Great Falls, MT on 21 May 2009.  We arrived back in Chewelah, WA on 30 August 2009, 102 days.  We drove 6,483 miles towing our trailer.  We traveled  another 3,542 miles sight seeing and doing other things for a total of 10,025 miles over all kinds of roads.  We stayed in 31 different campgrounds and RV parks.  Some we stayed in more than once. This at a cost of $2,473.67.  We purchased 752 gallons of diesel fuel at a cost of $2,649.46. This comes out to $3.52 average per gallon. We paid the most for fuel in Pelly Crossing, Yukon  - $5.07 per gallon. In Alaska, $4.73 in Cantwell was the most we paid. We purchased the book “Great Alaskan Tour Saver” which has 2-for-1 offers for $99.95. It paid for it’s self very shortly.  I would recommend it to anyone making an extended trip to Alaska.

It was a great trip and it had many days that I thought was the  highlight only to have something occur a few days later that was the highlight.  So we had many highlights.  We had very nice weather the first month of the trip with little rain.  The second and third month we had more rain and cooler weather.  We meet many nice people along the way, and many who gave us information on things to see and places to fish.  We didn’t use all the advice we got. But we were thankful for it.   With this all said we are planning our next trip to Alaska.

                                                     

Enchanted Highway, North Dakota

We took a drive to see the Enchanted Highway which takes you to Regent, ND.  We turned off  interstate I 94 at exit 72 and there is this huge sculpture of geese in flight.  It is 110 feet high and 156 feet long weighing over 75 tons. It was raised in 2001 and is the largest scrap metal sculpture in the world and is in the Guinness World Book of Records.  There are 7 of these sculptures along  the 32 miles to Regent, ND.

Geese In Flight  2001

    

The Deer Family 2002

  

Grasshoppers in the Field  1999

       

Fisherman’s Dream  2006

    

Pheasants on the Prairie 1996

 

Teddy Rides Again 1993

  

Tin Family  1991

 

After seeing all of this metal formed into great sculptures we were headed back to the RV park and came upon a field of grain being harvested.  This is a lot different than when I was a kid and had helped a couple of times at harvest time.  There were three combines cutting  swaths through the fields about thirty feet in width.  The machine cut the grain, removed the grain from the stem and stored it in a hopper and blew the chaff and straw back on the field.  There was a tractor pulling a large bin on wheels and would travel along side the combines and they would  unload into this bin with out stopping.  Once the bin was full he would pull up next to a semi waiting to take the grain to a storage bin.  We watched for about 15 minutes and in that time they harvested more grain than a whole crew would in a day back in the late 40’s and early 50’s.  This was really interesting.  I knew it was done this way, but this was the first time in years to see the actual operation. Barb had never seen grain harvested. This is the first stage of your bread.