Day 18: Jamestown ND to Billings, MT

Lot of distance to cover today, but I was keen to get out of North Dakota and into what I hoped would be the most amazing state yet, Montana. However thanks to a tip off from a friend I first went looking for the World's Largest Buffalo Statue. I found it alright, right next to the National Buffalo Museum. Yup. A buffalo museum. They also have a fully functional live bison herd, however they were all hiding when I went and all I saw was a cat.

Yup, ok. It's big a concrete and a dubious claim to fame. I drove down to the other end of town to checkout the railway yards and found, surprisingly enough, a grain elevator!

While staring at it a truck arrived and unloaded, and then a train went past, complete with Warbonnet loco on the front (still with Santa Fe markings too). Further down the road at the "yards" (glorified siding) I spotted three geeps, two still in Burlington Northern green & black paint (Burlington Northern being the first half of BNSF, and Santa Fe making up the rest).

I was soon on I94 and heading west. I drove, and drove some more, and 3 hours later came across signs for the World's Largest Scrap Metal Sculpture, on the Enchanted Highway. Ok, sure why not. I had a bit of trouble actually getting to it, as it seems they only plow the road in summer and the plow operator had given up. I believe this may be the first documented case of a Bobcat getting stuck. I continued on down the "enchanted highway" to Gladstone and found a small town.

Marooned bobcat / The town of Gladstone, ND

Also, what do you know, they have a grain elevator. Are you starting to see a theme here?

It appears if I'd taken the time to drive the 32 miles to Regent, ND, I would've seen many more large metal sculptures, including massive farmers and 60 ft high chickens. www.enchantedhighway.net if you're curious… I suspect it's very much a summer attraction though.

The 110 ft high sculpture / I also found some powerlines.

Back on I94 I went. Nearly an hour later I thought I was in Montana because I saw a sign warning I was in Mountain Time now. Imagine my surprise when I discovered I was still in North Dakota! The scenery had definitely changed though and was very pretty, albeit very cold.

I stopped at the ND border welcome centre and used their wifi for a bit. Car was saying 0°F outside, that is to say -18°C. At these kinds of temperatures you can lick your finger and draw a face on the window and it instantly turns to ice. Or a new one to me: if you huff on your camera screen to clean it, it turns to a thin film of ice!

I also found some nice fences, I honestly don't remember where or why though; it seems like a strange thing to stop and take photos of, even for me.

Further down the road, inside Montana now, I stopped at Terry and found a train.

It wasn't going anywhere through so I went down the road a bit.

I found lots of snow and little hills and frozen over rivers. It was all very pretty.

I drove back in time to catch the train moving:

… but then he parked across the crossing and I was stuck. So a quick detour to the other crossing in town and I found… a grain elevator. And the main township too. No plowed roads here.

Then I saw the reason for the hold up as an opposing grain train came roaring through town kicking up a great cloud of snow in the sunset.

… and then it was time for 8913 to continue on its way.

I drove on and late that night arrived in Billings, Montana. Interesting city, it was well and truly dark when I arrived and very cold too, hovering around that 0°F mark again. I was rather surprised to find several large towers; I haven't seen anything higher than 2 stories since I left the twin cities in Minnesota. The tower blocks had a random combination of lights on and combined with the cool winter air and make steam plumes that the city seems to spew out; well the effect was quite amazing! Great towers of spotted lights, rising into the black night and wrapped in glowing geysers of steam. I wish I'd taken some photos, but I was very tired and hungry and missed my chance. Wikipedia says over 100,000 people live in Billings and it's the largest city in Montana, so I shouldn't be surprised it has tall buildings. So far, Montana has impressed me, and I'm yet to even see a Montana Rail Link train, the main reason for exploring this state.

515 miles of driving today, that's over 800km, my longest stretch yet. But this marks the end of the major driving marathons for the next week or so, and instead I'll just be slowly hopping from city to city throughout Montana.