Purg8ory

No, I hadn’t passed out. It was another power cut, so I finished blogging in the dark!

Sunday, and finally scenic highway 35. Now I’m not good with guidebooks so I don’t remember where I got the info from, or even if I dreamt it, but scenic highway 35 sucked. I mean yes there’s a decent view of Lake Michigan every now and then but there is from every road around there. Oh well, I had a couple of scenic picnics then hit Wisconsin.

Once you get away from the Great Lakes you realise why anything with a view of a lake counts as scenic. Wisconsin becomes just fields and meadows. At least it’s better than being surrounded by trees. I was tiring of lakes, so decided not to potter North looking for more scenic roads (..and lake views) but to head for the hills. Unfortunately the hills are over a thousand miles away so there was going to be some interstate slogging first.

So where do you stay in the middle of Wisconsin? Well I mentioned I watched Titanic the other night and Jack Dawson talks about growing up in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin and ice fishing Lake Wissota. When I saw that they happen to be on the interstate to Minnesota, I thought “why not?”

By the time I reach Lake Wissota I’m busting for a pee, but the park ranger is very proud of her park:

“Hi and welcome to the park… normally it’s seven dollars, but today it’s a free house”

“Thanks, bye!”

“Here’s a map of our lovely park denoting all of our various facilities..”

“Facilities? Great! Where’s the restroom?”

“Well, we have a scenic lookout here, and a beach here, and a family campsite here…”

“…and they have a restroom?”

“There’s a chemical facility, yes, or if you drive further down the road, you’ll see there’s a launch strip for boats…”

Now I don’t know about you, but when I’ve got to go that bad I’m not interested in anything else, they could be dishing out free money or beer ice cream at the launch strip and I couldn’t give a monkey’s! So I tried my best not to run over her foot and went to take care of business.

Primary priority cleared, I discovered they do indeed have a nice park. I walked 3 miles down the lakeshore and back, and for the first time thought maybe I should get some camping gear. Then the kids started yelling and the insects started biting…

The car was claiming 102 degrees when I finished walking at 6pm. I think the car had gone a bit doo lally, but the temperature was still in the 80’s and set to get hotter the next day! I guess I missed ice fishing season.

I stayed at the Indian Head Motel (as in Native American, not Rajeev) and almost ducked under 50 dollars. However the sports bar next door was empty and the motel room was bloomin’ hot.

They say there’s more fat people in Wisconsin than any other state. So I was surprised at how hard it was to find breakfast! …and amazed to stand on an empty main street at 8.30am Monday! I love the small towns.

So it’s a shame that it’s Minneapolis next. I started off with MOA, or Mall Of America. I was disappointed to find myself in a medium-sized shopping centre in need of repair, then I discovered that was just the East Wing. There’s three more wings, four floors each and an amusement park in the middle with at least two roller coasters!

But I’m not into shopping and the back massage place was staffed by beefy men, so I’ll take Shepherd’s Bush’s Westfield centre and the Massage Angels any day!

My friend Steve married a girl from Minnesota so I asked him for a tip. He suggested Brit’s. The imaginatively named, but confusingly apostrophe’d British pub. It was very impressive, served a decent pint of Boddingtons and had a huge beer garden. I enjoyed a chat with a guy named Curtis, who worked for Wells Fargo and told me about life in Minneapolis.

It was only after I’d left and walked a few blocks in baking sun that I thought of one huge difference between Brit’s and a real pub. In England you pay for your beer when they give it to you, so when you empty a pint, you leave. So Curtis, if you’re reading this, I hope you didn’t end up paying for my beer!

I also discovered Minneapolis has the answer to the baking sun, in the form of skyways. Every block has a mall on the first floor (in the English sense of first floor!) and they’re linked between buildings by walkways. This keeps you out of the sun or snow! That is, if you can figure out the geography, and when you leave a building at street level it’s often not clear how to get up to the skyway in the next one, but still, a great idea when you get the hang of it.

So I actually enjoyed a city for once!

It then took an hour to drive one mile on the interstate, due to “pavement failure”, so I stopped in St. Cloud. Actually, I stopped there because the Days Inn had a big sign by the interstate advertising their pool and water slide! With temperatures in the 90s I was glad to get a chain hotel at a decent price for once.

Another quiet sports bar, another power cut. Actually, a power cut in a bar with forty screens was quite amusing. Like being back at work, but with less screaming!

Minnesota apparently has 10,000 lakes, but how many lakes can you appreciate? So it’s time to switch off with some good tunes and a blast up the interstate. The scenery gets more bleak and I reach Fargo, North Dakota, famous because a film was once set there.

With nothing else to do I visit Hooters. The locals tell me it was sub-zero temperatures here last week, and round here that’s zero Fahrenheit! Today it’s 95 degrees.

Even they can’t tell me about anything worth seeing until you reach the Western edge of the state, so I keep going to Bismarck, which has the other Hooters in North Dakota. Yes, I know, but I haven’t been in one since Connecticut!

I figure I’ll get a hotel room nearby so I can get pissed (in the English sense) but I end up getting pissed (in the American Sense) when they want 130 dollars plus tax in what looks like a cheap place. The place next door is full. I figure it’s the usual story with cities, so I’ll just not drink and get a place out of town. What I haven’t figured is that this is North Dakota. There isn’t anything out of town!

The “next town over” is ninety miles away. Oh well, at least you can do 75 on the interstate and it’s a sunny evening. But out here the storms gather quickly, and I’m suddenly in a deluge. Not the English, “ooh my wipers can barely keep up” stuff, more “Holy crap I can’t see anything!”

Actually, that’s not just our weedy rain, it’s their pathetic highways. Concrete highways, poor drainage, dim lines, no cats eyes, it’s only because they have so much space they don’t end up in a mangled heap every time it pitter patters.

Anyhoo, the shower is short-lived, and thankfully I’m not, and things brighten up briefly. I’m then passed by three matching vans with a lot of aerials and “Storm chaser tours” on the side. Gulp!

The clouds darken formidably, then form pretty rainbows and I don’t know whether to take cover or pictures. I stop at a rest stop and attempt to use the dodgy wifi to find a hotel but it’s hopeless. I reach the next town, Dickinson, but it’s full. This could be a long night so I stock up on food and drink and fill the tank.

Then a light pops up on the dash saying “Maintenance Required”. Oh crap, what now? I know it’s due for a service soon and really hope that’s just the service light coming on!

So what now? Stop at every hotel and get nowhere? Drive further away? Find a better wifi spot?

I’ve been on the road for ten hours and don’t want to sit still. Back on highway 2 the motels were by the road and had vacancy signs, if I can get back up there I can just drive until I see a room. So I head North. Besides, it’s the scenic route I would be taking tomorrow.

But there’s the problem, ND finally provides some twists and turns just as it goes dark and another storm kicks in. Roads I dream about driving in the daytime become a nightmare of aqua-planing puddles and dark precipices. Without “cats eyes” I can barely make out the road. I can’t get out of the way of the impatient trucks behind because I can’t see where is safe to pull over. The turns also lengthen the journey. What looked like a fifty mile jaunt takes a couple of interminable hours. Finally I reach Watford City and stagger into the motel to once again find my two least favourite words waiting for me: No vacancy. I plead with the owner for suggestions, but:

“I’m sorry son, the whole damn state is full”

Onward to highway 2, but it’s the same story. A kind receptionist rings round the whole town, but both hotels are full.

I’m screwed.

I don’t like North Dakota. So I give myself a small pick-me-up by crossing into Montana and find a rest stop (basically a car park with a restroom) where a few trucks have stopped. Fortunately the rest stop is not too bad. I’ve stayed in noisier hotels, and there’s a reasonable restroom.

The car’s sodding uncomfortable but at least it’s a warm day right? Nope, it’s dropped from 95 at lunchtime to 45 degrees! I don’t envy the likes of Sam Smith camping out with his bike, or the Canadian hitch-hikers. I do envy their sleeping bags and tents though! Luckily I have a lot of clothes, so I layer up, but then I have a panic attack – “What if I can’t get a hotel tomorrow, or the next day…” (Hey I didn’t call myself the Road Worrier for nothing, and after driving 15 hours I’m beyond exhausted!) Somehow I get a grip, calm down and finally get some broken sleep.

At six am, (or is it five - I passed back and forth across time zones last night!) I head off in search of breakfast. After an hour I find Nirvana.

It comes in the shape of a café with a friendly old waitress, fast service and free wi-fi. I’ve never been so happy to book a Holiday Inn.