August 10, 2011

View of the day-The sunflowers are looking pretty good along the highway north of Gettysburg.

We were up early to get the camper flanged in, get the camping bill paid and get settled up with the farmer before leaving the Burg for the last time this season.

We got out to the farm where the Freight was waiting, got the tractor chained back down from the big tire change, then started rolling. This time we had more than construction to deal with. We were about 30 miles into our journey we came up behind a cyclist "in" one of those recumbent, pod-looking kind of things. He was clipping along at a reasonable pace...for a bike, at least...and he pulled over onto the wide shoulder. Too bad the rest of the cyclists didn't have the same common sense.

Further up the road they were doubling up and the first few pairs went into single file and pulled over to the shoulder, but that didn't last long as the rest of them stayed in our lane. We had no problem sharing the road with them, but for some reason they didn't have the common sense to pull over going up a hill, which created a nasty road hazard. Marilyn was only pulling the camper, but it was still unnerving and she could only warn Al of the trouble he was likely to encounter...at least she could tell him if there was any oncoming traffic to deal with. We got through that batch of trouble unscathed...although there might have been some bike shorts that required scraping out.

Just before we got to the ND construction, we came up behind another bike tour...this time regular pedal bikes, with more of the same attitudes...some, not all of them. Al was following the team porta-potty on a trailer up a hill when it decided not to pass the bikers...at the last minute. He is glad the Freight has good brakes...and that the three vehicles behind him did too.

We finally made Hazelton and got the Freight parked, then got directions to our parking spot for the camper from Gerry Prevost. Because we are so close to Bismarck, the camping spots are all full with displaced flood victims, making it tough to find a place to park. Gerry and Lynn park in their farmer's yard so they were able to find us a plug in for the camper and since we are going back home for a wedding, we don't need anything else.

We got parked, plugged in, then went out to the field where Prevost's were finishing their last field of winter wheat. They were short a man for the day, so Al finally got to driver a new semi and haul grain, while Marilyn kept Lynn company in the cart tractor...and it ain't no 2390 Case.

Once they had the field finished, we went back to their camper and enjoyed a home made meal. Then Lynn and Marilyn went into Bismarck to drop some cash at Walmart. They had an early night, getting back around midnight...earlier than the usual 3am jaunts Marilyn usually goes on...then it was blog time.

Unfortunately the bins we were parked beside cut the signal, so no blog last night...expect two today...