God is so good to us. We just arrived in Ely, Minnesota on the Boundary Waters Area between Canada and Minnesota.
It is November and we are so blessed to have a couple days of stunning Fall weather to enjoy it before winter comes in end of the week with 14 degrees!
For the past 6-7 weeks, we called Buffalo Lake, Minnesota our home which is some of the most fertile and perfect farmland in the world. I hired on as a contract semi truck driver hauling field corn, soybeans and a few sugar beets.
With this being the first time in Minnesota, first time driving a semi, and the first time seeing how these farms work, the learning curve was steep, fast and fascinating!
To give an idea of how much is produced in America’s farms, Brian Ryberg farms a slightly larger than average acreage at 6500 acres. He has 5 sugar beet trucks and 4 grain (corn/soybean) trucks running for pretty much 7 weeks in the field 7 days (off for church Sunday mornings!) for 10-16 hours a day!
In that time frame I estimate hauling 20-30 million pounds of grains with just the one truck. Now imagine that across the whole breadbasket of America. It is simply mind boggling to digest how many crops are planted and harvested in our country.
No wonder China wants to conquer us!
Watch the video to see how farming is done in Minnesota!
This is the video accompanying yesterdays’ post. I separated them to see if the word blog loads faster.
Would love to hear your comments on how this works for you. We have heard from some (Dave) that they really don’t watch the video and would rather have the written story.
Whatever.
I recommend you use headphone as sometimes our recording are done in windy conditions and it is hard to hear!
For the next three or four weeks I will be driving a semi tractor trailer hauling sugar beets, field corn and soybeans from the fields to various storage and collecting facilities. For some (like me) the methods, processes and machinery to plant, grow, harvest and process beets to sugar, corn to ethanol, and soybeans to everything? is fascinating. I’ll spare you the details.
Since we left you last in Rapid City in June there have been a few more miles and a few more sights along the way.
One of the questions we have always been asked, whether on the boats or in RVs is “what is your favorite place?”. Our stock answer is “everywhere we go has its own special characteristics and there is no one place”. If there was, we might be tempted to stay!
We must admit though to a certain attraction to the Black Hills of South Dakota. I understand why the Dakota, Cheyenne, Sioux and other great Indian tribes fought so hard to keep their land.(It was certainly managed much better in those days!)
We stayed in an RV park just outside of Rapid City most of June while exploring from Custer State Park in the southern part through the mountains, Hill City, Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse monuments, and up through the north to the old mining towns of Deadwood and Lead.
So much history combined with so much beauty and so many possibilities.
There is a 110 mile hiking trail from Custer State Park through the mountains all the way north past Sturgis. I called Ryan and Ian to say let’s do it! Ian had to decline as he is being transferred to the AFB in Tucson from Valdosta, but Ryan was enthusiastic. We planned for an early September start and 8-10 days to complete it.
With engagements looming in Michigan and North Carolina we headed east across South Dakota, Minnesota and then northeast towards Wisconsin and the upper peninsula of Michigan.
What a beautiful country! Long straight roads with vast vistas in every direction and nothing but prairies and planted fields. Many of the small towns on the two lane roads we travel on have the nicest city parks with a couple of camping spots.
We have thoroughly enjoyed these and have been surprised with Friday night high school football games, rodeos, old flour mills, lakes , paths and much more.
In a state park on Lake Superior on the northern shore of Michigan’s upper peninsula, on the longest day of the year (June 21) the temperature was 42, with winds to 25 mph. Mo loved surfing the cold waters of the lake!
We wandered down through cherry orchards and Lake Michigan shoreline drives to Muskegon to Ian and his new bride’s family home and celebration. Michiganders are good folks!
The Indiana State Fair people had called and wanted us back for the state fair to run their RV campground in August so we puttered our way to NC to spend time with Shelly’s Mom. The campground we ended up in was a gold and gem mining mini tourist place but absolutely beautiful in summer. Mo got to spend much time in the river for those two weeks!
July 23 – August 21 we were in Indianapolis IN in a big field under a walnut tree helping 350 RVs in and out of the parking spaces and popping over to the fairgrounds to watch the 450,000 or so visitors to the fair. (Few masks)
We did get to watch the one remaining Wilson brothers from the Beach Boys perform with a large band. The other major member of the band was the grown son of one of the other original members! It was memorable!
From Indianapolis, we turned back west through Illinois, Missouri, Nebraska and back into South Dakota to meet up with Ryan for a 100 miles 10 day hike. As an aside we have now traveled through every state except CA, OR, WA, AK, and HI.
Here is a bit of advice. Do not go hiking in the mountains with a 30 pound pack with a time deadline so you try to make 15 miles a day with no practice. It is very – how shall I say – challenging?
It kicked our butts. On the morning of the 3rd day we hiked 10 more miles by 1030am and were now looking up at the Needles and the mountains where Mt Rushmore is. Steep and rocky.
With very sore feet, very sore hips where the packs rode, sore knee joints and 90% chance for heavy rain I made the call to turn around and hike a mile back to a highway we had crossed and call Shelly to come get us. I can’t say Ryan was too upset! I like to use the excuse that I was thinking of Shelly and wanted Ryan to spend some time with his Mom – but…
Next time we practice first. We both agree the 25 miles we did was awesome and we really want to do more.
After Ryan flew out to Atlanta, we had some decisions to make. We had been looking at property in the Black Hills but realized prices were so inflated that it would be insane to even look.
Then in my daily email showing people wanting temporary help from RVers, an ad for truck drivers for three weeks in Minnesota popped up. So here we sit on a very pretty lake in a county campground waiting for sugar beet, field corn and soybean harvest to start!
Both of us think this is a very good place to sit and watch the world fall apart. When it does we will be more than willing to help put it back together again.
It has been a fun spring into summer. Summer in South Dakota means 45 one day and 90 the next! We added lots of miles to the truck in the last three months and have seen some breathtaking scenery.
The video is long this time as I have again procrastinated posting but we hope you will watch it as it covers some of America’s most beautiful and open country. It is much better if you watch it full screen with the little button on lower left corner…
Tucson was dry, hot, windy and busy but the surrounding country was awesome. In a space of a week, we decided to swap our RV. We found the same floor plan 2010 Newmar in Mobile Al, made an offer, drove the 3600 miles round trip to get it and bring it back in three days. Then we deep cleaned it, moved everything from the 2007 Newmar to the newer one, swapped the tires (in the RV park), some of the furniture, all of my customized batteries, chargers etc, cleaned the old one and sold it in three days. The market is hot to say the least. Then we got back on the road!
The week we spent traveling from Tucson through Apache and Comanche country to New Mexico sure made you appreciate how the west was changed – by the native Indians to the Spanish to the miners, settlers and soldiers who all lived and died here. Through Globe, Show Low, and across into New Mexico where we found one of the old cattle and sheep drive destination towns that looks very similar to the way it did when the drivers spent weeks to get their herds to market.
Southern New Mexico including White Sands National Monument, 3 Rivers Petroglyphs Site, and the Lava Flows were all in the same basin and amazing to see.
If you ever get a chance to visit here – do it! Alamogordo, White Sands, Ski Apache, and amazing Pueblo sites all in a relatively small area.
On our first trip out here four years ago we found the 4 Corners area and especially Bluff, Utah and Valley of the Gods. We promised ourselves to come back and we did!
From there, we headed north towards Big Sky country through Moab, Wyoming, Ogden, and up into Idaho. The two lane backroads where we go are sometimes a bit intimidating, lightly trafficked, and usually extremely interesting. We love these roads and the things we stumble into. This trip is no exception.
It was chilly up through Idaho and into Montana (almost all the way to Canada!). But we were early in the season and there were no people anywhere! We visited friends in Troy, Montana for a couple of weeks (look at where it is on a map!) and helped with a project before heading back south towards Helena and Yellowstone. The forests of northeastern Montana have to be seen to be believed. Truly awe inspiring. When we arrived in Helena the weather was calling for 22 degrees and snow in Yellowstone (if you didn’t know Yellowstone sits atop the Rocky Mountains in northern Wyoming! in addition of the four access roads into the park only two had been opened yet, so we decided to pass this go round and keep moving east.
East meant across the grasslands to Custer’s last stand at Little Big Horn (awesome!). To walk this battlefield where Custer probably got what he deserved is incredibly moving. They have stones where each of the over 250 army and some of the attacked Indians fell. There is also a national war cemetery here. Visiting here initiated interest in learning more that lead me to read a book about one of the Cheyenne tribe who fought here to learn that side of the story. There is always two sides to every story.
From there is more grasslands to the beautiful Black Hills of South Dakota and the towns where Calamity Jane, Wild bill Hickock and others made history. As well, there are places we had heard stories of like Sturgis (largest motorcycle rally in the world in August), Deadwood, and Lead SD (an old frontier mountain mining town) where there is recently deactivated mine ONE MILE underground and where the Sanford Underground Laboratory at the bottom of the mine is helping business boom! Look that one up too!
We are already all the way back to North Carolina and I write this – and will have an update soon. If I don’t, it will be another 20 minute video!
And finally a comment about the current state of affairs in our country. If you are upset about the way things are going – may I suggest you get involved? Serve if you can in whatever capacity you can. Run for local office, school board, council, political party delegate. Whatever! If you can’t do that, then at minimum contribute your voice by attending council meetings or anything you can get to to be heard and find out what they are doing. We have to take this thing back before we lose it. I have faith in the bigger picture – but to ensure we fill the gap that is about to be created we need to be there ready to go. Just my two cents.
God is so good to us. We just arrived in Ely, Minnesota on the Boundary Waters Area between Canada and Minnesota.
