From Hixton to Jamestown, North Dakota

Woke up after a rough sleep last night, and hit the road as soon as we could.

The skies were extremely over cast, threatening our first real sign of rain. Once on the road, the skies opened up. It poured rain for most of our trip into Jamestown. Temperature stayed a constant 17 - 20 degrees.

When we closed in on Annadale, Minnesota we saw some Aerial power-line work. A worker was suspended in a harness from a helicopter, hovering over the power-lines. We saw him slowly being lowered to the ground. Takes a lot of guts to be able to do this.

Saw lots of birds along the way, at one point near the border of North Dakota, we spotted a large group of hawks circling a group of trees. there had to be at least 10 birds flying there. Not a common sight, or common behaviour for hawks.

Seeing as we had a very wet day, we didn't get to see too much, or get out to do anything overly interesting, but we did stop at a few rest stops that gave us history lessons. There were large bronze plaques that told us a bit of US history. One talked about Wisconsin's participation and dilemmas in World War 1. We also found out that Charles Lindenberg was a native from Minnesota. Pretty fascinating stuff.

When we reached Pelican Rapids, Mauvereen couldn't drive any more, so she and Kim did a "Chinese Fire Drill", except their joints were so seized they actually did a Geriatric Shuffle to switch places for the next leg of the journey.

At one of the rest stops there was a long path down to what looked like a lake. The sign told us that we were looking at the headwaters of the Mississippi River.

Now that we are back in North Dakota, we have officially crossed the Continental divide more than once. Pretty neat.

We made it to our hotel around 5:30, and went for a quick bite to eat at the restaurant next door. The Pizza Ranch. Interesting concept, you choose what you want to eat from their menu and order it, or pay for the buffet before you take your seat. We both chose the buffet, had LOTS of salad, plus had fried chicken, mashed potatoes and beans. Not too bad for $8. We got lucky and the rain took a break right after we finished eating, so it was a dry jog back to the hotel.

We're now comfortably in our hotel room, watching America's Got Talent, and getting ready for some shut-eye. We'll be off to Billings Montana tomorrow.