September 17, 2011
Pierre, SD
Today's drive was almost due south. "Almost" because we continued west
on US-2 for a short distance before turning south on ND-3. We stopped for breakfast at the "Corner
Cafe" in Rugby, North Dakota.
They're located at the "geographical center of North America. Don't believe me? They have a monument out front and
everything. I'm not sure I agree with
their calculations (Acapulco's probably close, but the Arctic Circle?), but
we've actually been to the other two of the four compass points in our travels,
so that's cool.
We followed ND-3 south to I-94. This is an area that's home to numerous small
lakes and ponds. Since they wanted to
make the road relatively straight, there are all sorts of causeways that run
right through them. Last spring's
flooding did a number on these stretches of road, and construction resources
are obviously stretched thin. There's no
way that they'll get all these fixed before winter.
After a quick jog west on I-94, we turned south again on
US-83, except when we ran into a "little" detour due to more
reconstruction. In this case, we were
sent 21 miles east then 22 miles south before heading back west on US-14 to
US-83. We were then able to make our way
to Pierre, our South Dakota State Capitol.
We found a nice spot at the local Super-Wally and had a relaxing
evening.
A few thoughts on North Dakota: it's dirty and it's not likely to get better
any time soon. It's not the fact that
only 40% of the roads are paved so everything gets covered in dust. It's more that the people don't seem to care,
in a "who cares if all the Walmart bags are blowing in the wind" or a
"what do you mean I'm not supposed to throw the coffee cup/pop
bottle/ashtray contents out on the road" kind of way.
Many areas seem to have a boom-town or "wild west" attitude in
places but it's borne of the tragedy of flooding as opposed to more permanent
development opportunities. All in all,
we won't likely be back for a while...
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