August 18

View of the day-Beer clouds over Main Street in Tuttle.

A very productive day, and one where the clouds, humidity and misting rain meant nothing.

We went back to the field at Robinson where Al took the grain truck to the yard, unloaded and settled up with the farmer. He managed to bring home a bonus in the form of homemade bread, cookies and preserves...yum. Marilyn took the shop trailer back to where the combine and trailer was parked at the highway intersection a mile east of Tuttle and blew out the air filters, rad and chaff off the combine. Al brought the tractor and grain cart into Tuttle and after parking the shop trailer strategically by the camper, Marilyn picked him up and went back out to load the combine and hook up the truck to the trailer.

Once that rig was ready to go, it was back to town where Al paid the camping bill and Marilyn picked up lunch at the grocery store, then it was off to load the tractor and grain cart. After that task was done, it was back out to hook up the header to the pickup and move it and the combine north to Bowbells, about 190 miles.

The trip was uneventful. Marilyn tried to buy new air filters for the combine at the Case dealer in Harvey. The parts man told her the "closest store that had one was in Moosomin, Sask., where ever that is". No parts so she bought Al a toy tractor(a 1/16 1568 V8 International) for his birthday, since the hockey tickets fell through. Al fueled up in Drake, and it was straight through to Kenmare where Marilyn needed fuel. While Marilyn fueled up, Al got directions from the farmer on where to park the machinery, and we headed off to Bowbells.

How many times we have passed that little town, occasionally stopping to mail something, but never really exploring? Maybe 8 or 10 times a year for the past 16 years. How many other towns do we pass through without even noticing, that we may end up calling home for a short time, at some point in time? Deep thoughts...

Once we got out to the field and unloaded the combine, the farmer took us out to show us the fields we would be combining, once they were ready. Nice and flat and less than a 5 mile haul, sweet change of pace.

We started back to Tuttle and stopped in Minot for a late supper, then hit the highway. We made it back to Tuttle around 11:30pm, tired but with a good feeling of accomplishment.

We will be camping right in Bowbells and my WiFi finder shows that I might not have to drive too far to get connected for the daily upload. No trees in the campground, about 50 feet from the main rail line with two sets of tracks and a block from the elevator...we will be longing for the quiet solitude of Hamill, SD or Tuttle.

Ah well, a new adventure...