A TRIP TO NORTH DAKOTA

We had to attend the wedding of our niece at the International Peace Gardens between Manitoba and North Dakota at the beginning of July, 2009. Since it was our niece, my wife flew up to Minot to help her sister get ready, and I, being too cheap just to go anywhere, set off to shoot BNSF on the old Northern Pacific line across North Dakota. After leaving Tucson about 6 am, I spent the first night 850+ miles later in Castle Rock, just south of Denver, Colorado. I have made it to Cheyenne, Wyoming (1005 miles) in a day, but I guess age is creeping up on me and I don't really feel like doing that any more. I set off for Glendive, Montana, the start of BNSF's Dickinson Sub, next morning and arrived early afternoon after driving up through the Powder River coal fields, seeing a reasonable number of trains on the way. I spent a couple of weeks shooting my way across the state, ending up at Casselton, west of Fargo and the end of the Jamestown Sub. The Badlands were interesting, and I got to meet a couple of BNSF MoW employees, the first being somewhat aggressive! I'm quite entertained (after the fact) that they seem to know to an inch where the property line is (your tripod is trespassing). This one told me, in addition the the usual Department of Homeland Security, need permission to take pictures of trains, trespassing etc, that I was obviously up to no good since my car doesn't have plates! Arizona is a one plate state and thus no plate on the front. So he walked over to my car and put the tailgate down to check if I had a rear plate. A while later his supervisor showed up to check me out, but was a good deal more polite. Otherwise there were no problems on the trip, mostly excellent weather and my car didn't do anything it shouldn't. We had a good time at the wedding, catching up with a number of in-laws and nieces and nephews. I did get stopped for speeding on the way back to the hotel after the wedding, and got to sit in the front of a state trooper's car while he checked me out. Since I was well dressed, sober and polite, and have a clean record, I got off with a warning. After dropping my daughter off at Minot airport at 4 am, I set off for home. I didn't realize it until well in to the drive home, but the big Sturgis bike festival was going on and North Dakota was FULL of motor bikes. I made it to Castle Rock again, and was home the next day.