Day 20 – Bowbells, ND (Thursday May 21, 2015)
I took down my tent, packed up and was on my bike by 7:15am. I stopped down at “Sista’s” restaurant for french toast and discovered that the service hadn’t got any better overnight.
I had a second breakfast in Estevan in good time at 10:30am. Although there were “local” choices I picked Dairy Queen. I wanted to count on quickness, cleanliness and a smile.
I crossed the border into North Dakota at North Portal SK at about 1:30pm. The border guards were good guys and were curious about a crazy old man riding across the country on his bicycle. They asked what I had in my panniers and I made the mistake to list my food items. Apparently my rice was not allowed into the US and was confiscated. Who would have thought? My wife Ann packed that rice. It was healthy nutritious brown rice. Don’t tell Ann but I didn’t like that rice. It made eating my camping meal a chore and I am glad it is gone. Now I can go and buy some white rice with impunity.
It may be important to note that the stretch of east bound highway on number 5 doesn’t have much of a shoulder. Typically the shoulder would be described thus from right to left: there’s a white line, then about 12 inches of a rumbles strips, then a strip of about 4-10 inches of good pavement intended for bicyclists like me, then about 4 feet of gravel. The strip of good pavement for bicyclists varied in width depending on the whim of the highway builders. On highway 5 to boot here is one lane of traffic in each direction with a speed limit of 65 miles per hour.
There a number of things I learnt when riding on a narrow strip of pavement:
- You get better at riding in a straight line.
- Your grip gets stronger.
- Rumble strips act like brakes. (So does gravel)
- Livestock trucks push the most wind.
I gave up travelling on this thin strip of due to difficulty and decided instead to use the road when there was no traffic. I started thinking that avoiding Ontario’s highways north of Lake Superior by traveling in the US was a dumb idea.
Luckily the traffic was sparse, the drivers gave me the next lane (when they could) and the highway improved significantly to 9 feet of paved shoulder once the highway headed south to Bowbells.
There are no campground in Bowbells. I am staying at an acceptable motel with a shower, laundry and a bed. Isn’t quite as good as the tent but it will have to do.
