Upper Midwest Tour Day 6, July 15

 The rain last night made breaking camp and packing a slow process.

Did we have all of this stuff in the car?  The tent, its fly and ground sheet, and air mattresses are catching the sun's ray in an attempt to dry out.  But we managed to get everything stowed and were away without much trouble by 9:30 am.  We had "elevenses" in Dickinson, finding a unique coffeehouse in a converted church.  The baristas were initially cautious since they had to restart/reboot their expresso machine (evidently a very old one) and were not sure if it would work.  We waited about 5 minutes and it came to life.  We ordered drinks quickly and successful enjoyed our break.  

The inside, with a nice vaulted ceiling and arced, stained glass windows.

The outside of the coffeehouse.

We then drove to Bismarck, ND, crossing into the central time zone.  We checked into our hotel and immediately went off to do a volkswalk around the Capital area.  The location of the walk "information box" was at a visitor center that closed at 4:00 pm; we arrived at 4:20 pm.  So, we made our own volkswalk.  There was lots of parking available near the capital building and we started our tour there.  Below are two photos of the Capital -- we assume the low rise building houses the chambers, etc., and the high rise structure probably includes the legislators' offices and houses state employees. 

We walked around the grounds/mall area enjoying the statues, displays (particularly the French Gratitude Train Car - I never knew that, in 1949, the French gave the U.S. 49 carloads of gifts in appreciation for our help to them during the world wars, one car to each state), and an arboretum with 50+ trees, identified with in ground markers (sorry, no photos).

Bison Statue in honor North Dakota's Centennial.  It made with many bits of rebar, welded together.  It is hollow inside.

Sakakawea Statute with Baby Pomp.

We left the Capital grounds and strolled through neighboring residential areas, finding the former Governor's Mansion, used until 1960.  The current mansion is on a corner of the Capital grounds, near the Arboretum.

We ended our walk at 4.8 miles and then drove a toward a commercial area to look for restaurants.  We ended up at Anima Cucina, combination wine bar and bakery. with cheerful staff  We had a light, tasty dinner of salads, smoked trout board and desserts.  The draft beer list looked a little too exotic so we both opted for hard apple cider.

After dinner, we drove to a Missouri River riverside park to view a replica 55-foot, full-scale keelboat, just like the one Lewis and Clark used during their exploration in 1805.  It was used on the river and carried a variety of plants and animals (or skeletons) back downriver.

On to Minnesota tomorrow.