Sheyenne State Forest - Day 233

  Today was really an oddball day. It was sort of a day off. I spent the morning working on logistics for some backpacking I will need to do in Minnesota. Then in the afternoon Jerry Warner took us for a ride in General Hank. He's a 1944 Jeep. What fun! I liked it better than my ride in a Corvette a few years ago.

We did have a destination in mind. We went to hike the miles of the North Country Trail in the Sheyenne State Forest. I'll bet you didn't know North Dakota had any state forests. There are six of them, but the other five are all in the far north portion of the state.

For years the NCT has had these 4.2 miles of trail, but they don't connect to anything. Getting landowner permissions for passage on each side of the forest has so far been impossible.

Omer agreed to walk one portion of the trail with us. The gate is welcoming, but only to hikers. The idea is to help keep horses off the trail. They do have their own trail.

Most of the miles are indeed in the woods, which is pretty unusual for North Dakota. It was nice to have a local guide because I had not known this is a mineral spring. The water has been tested, and it is safe for drinking. It has that oily taste of mineral water, so I only had a little. But it was nice and cold.

There are actual hills in the Forest, and some of them have views.

But the destination of the hike was North Dakota's only waterfall. You may find this leaving you speechless. Here you go.

Then we got invited out for dinner by another Gerry, with a G, and his wife Deb.

Where did we go? To a renovated 1916 school building that is finding new life. The primary business is wool. Processing, dyeing, spinning, teaching people how to do these things and knit, crochet, weave, etc. But they also use the added (1960s) gym as an event venue, they rent rooms on the upper floor, and once a week they serve food (although you can book private parties). I think half the population of North Dakota was there.

What did we have? Pizza!

On the way home, we got to experience the big sky effect. This thunderhead was building and then discharging behind us. Ahead of us there was a rainbow.

So, I walked 7.9 miles today. 4.2 of them are unique NCT miles, But I'm not going to count them in the total yet, because they don't connect.

See Fort Ransom Area