West Trip 2025

After our steak dinner, we took a drive into Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  One of the things I love doing when we stop at visitors centers, is to see if there’s an auditorium or  viewing area, where they’ll often be showing a film about the park. It’s a quick way to learn about what the park has to offer and if there’s any specific parts of it we should make sure to see. The film shown at Roosevelt incorporated the story of the man himself, who started off an explorer/rancher and ended up President. His home property here was preserved nearby, but like other parks, the square mileage is so large, we wouldn’t have time to go visit that particular area. Instead, we opted for a slow ride down a 30 mile loop road that was closed at one end, requiring us to turn around and backtrack. This worked out nicely as we were able to get a second look at certain things. For instance, Caleb insisted he saw some turkeys, which I admit I felt skeptical about. I didn’t realize there were w...

 After a second night at Lost Johnny Point Campground (I’d like to hear the story behind that name.) on the sprawling and huge Hungry Horse Lake, we headed northeast toward North Dakota.   By the way, I couldn’t get a great picture but this what a forest fire looks like about 10 years later. The sun hits the forest floor, no longer held back by a canopy of tree tops, and the seed bank that has been patiently waiting for this moment, jump at the chance to sprout. It’s similar to the effects of a clear-cut back east. You could spend a whole summer exploring this 34 mile  lake. I would need something better than my little 2.5 horsepower motor for that though. We went through a section of what appeared to be a cattle ranch that had dozens upon dozens of these little shacks, with solar panels on top. I have no idea what purpose they serve, but you can bet I wish I had as a hunting shack back home. Lots of old grain elevators across North Dakota. This one was actually in p...