American Road Trip 1 : Porcupine Mtns to North Dakota

Day Three: Porcupine Mountains to Chippewa Nat’l Forest

Early morning is probably the best time to visit the three falls along the river here. Again, eerily, no one is on these trails—outside of the occasional wooden post suggesting a marker, I can easily imagine these as they have always been. . . . My closing view of the Porcupine Mountains is of the slow waters of the Presque Isle River emptying into Superior.

Most of the day was spent, then, wandering from tiny town to tiny town: Rose Peak (Pop. 425), Benning (Pop. 112), Pole’s Lake (Pop. 52). From Michigan’s Upper Peninsula through Wisconsin and most of northern Minnesota, a long wooded patrol of abandoned gas stations (“Where is the nearest station?” “Don’t know. Next town, mebbe”), homes the size of hunter shacks (their doors open and rotting), battered trucks in high weed. Religious fundamentalism is in high form here with hand-painted signs in lawns arguing for “Unconditional Election” (John Calvin?), “No Jesus, No Peace,” and, disconcertingly, “Devotional Paintball.” The forests are thick with mosquitoes. This America votes, too.

I detoured through 13 along the northern coast of Wisconsin in hopes of exploring the Apostle Islands, but the short trip through tiny Bayfield was enough to turn me away—suddenly the primitive was filled with flower-boxed coffee shops and tourist-priced boat tours, the small dock clogged with plaid-skirted or fishing-hatted seniors paying $60 for a three-hour tour. The Apostles may be pretty, but I’ll save my land travels for a road less traveled.

That road took me to the Red Cliff Indian reservation, some Lake Superior lakeshore, and—again—a walk and lunch along the rocks and water with no one in sight.

This was soon to end as I reached Minnesota (with apologies to Duluth because it has a beautiful skyway and views): I pushed past Grand Rapids through the Chippewa to Bemidji, but was completely unable to find a campground (that wasn’t a KOA RV heaven) or even a hotel. I drove 40 miles back through the Chippewa and found a remote insect-laden site deep in the woods. By this time it was late, a crew of drunken boys made random animal noises somewhere in the distance (probably more dangerous than the animals if I knew where they were), and I pitched my tent and slept.

Day Four: Minnesota to Minot, ND

Fled Minnesota early after I broke down and bought a large breakfast. As I predicted, the forests finally clear away quickly, leaving flat land and a sky piled high with clouds. Outside Bemidji, everything west and into North Dakota is an exercise in industrial agriculture: towns are labeled as the “Cattle Capital” and the “Ethanol Empire;” gray grain silos with only company abbreviations (CHF or STU) rise hundreds of feet over the miles of wheat and corn, perhaps obscuring the missile silos which are managed by nearby Air Force bases.

Every truck is a Chevy with rear windows painted with US flags. Men stand in circles near stopped field machinery, their hands stuffed in the back pockets of jeans. North Dakota may be the most obese state in the nation. The ride is very long, but I am saved by books on CD.

Devil’s Lake is a welcome reprieve. I turn south along 57 to reach Fort Totten and a National Wildlife Refuge, but along the way (passing the Spirit Lake Reservation’s hilltop casino), I pass atop the rocky transom over the lake itself. Devil’s Lake has long been a site of the old Chautauqua tents which traveled with their revival shows (love irony), but this lake has lived up to its name.

The shores are desperately engineered rocks against an angry blue-slate water which apparently has been rising for years. The lake has no rivers to drain it. Melt-off feeds it. And dozens of feet out in every direction are the corpses of trees rising from the water as it slowly consumes more real estate. Signs warn me to watch for water over the road. Boats anchor in the turbulent water to fish among the treetops.

Fort Totten (once a barracks for the army to defend railroads against Indians—never needed; once an Indian school, once a tuberculosis clinic) is now a tourist museum currently being formed. I am left to wander the buildings (there are no others here) on my own and I see the effort to “Kill the Indian, Save the Man,” our country’s historical goal of ethnocentrically reprogramming boys and girls, removing the primitive culture and civilizing them. Of course, we abandoned this approach in the 1930s, but the residue of our history is outside the steel fence around the grounds: the Spirit Lake reservation is here, its boarded one-story square homes have tire-anchored rooftops over the littered yards—they are reminiscent of some of the slums of Nepal. The casino, at least, is doing well.

Rugby, the geographical center of North America, has only that to show for itself. A small cairn of rocks sits before an internet café to announce the honor.

And, with trepidation, I chose to splurge on a hotel room for a hot shower tonight, and to find one in Minot (rhymes with “Why Not?”). Yes, I had heard when I entered ND that Minot was hosting the State Fair this week. I did not know that Taylor Swift was doing a sold-out show here. I also did not know that the State Fairgrounds were the first thing I would encounter off the exit. The people lined up for 40,000 carnival games, three automobile contests (beginning with Monster Trucks), two rodeos, 42 elephant ear stands, and Taylor Swift seats are a mash of color and sugar and exhaust fumes. North Dakota may be the most obese state in the nation.

On a whim, I check a hotel here and ask if there is a room. The woman sets down the phone and says that she just received a cancellation; I have the last room available in town. And the shower is hot.