Friday, September 18, 2009

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

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The Deer Family 2002

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Grasshoppers in the Field  1999

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Fisherman’s Dream  2006

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Pheasants on the Prairie 1996

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Teddy Rides Again 1993

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Tin Family  1991

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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.

 

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