Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Tuesday June 18th - Madison, WI to Bismarck, North Dakota – 710 miles



Nothing spectacular to-day, just a riding day heading for home. It started off cloudy and very cold, the coldest day by far since leaving home. It must have been at least 30 degrees below yesterday afternoon. However, the sky cleared early afternoon, and it became sunny but not hot, just right for riding.
Once clear of Madison, the traffic thinned out, and continued to do so as I headed north on I90/94. As the weather forecasters were indicating more storms coming from the south, I decided to travel further north through North Dakota. This meant hitting the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, but I reckoned I would be there after the main rush. At least to-day would be free of the toll bandits. Man, those eastern states really milk the tolls, and the condition of the freeways needs some work with our tax payers’ money.
June is road construction month, and there was substantial road work throughout Wisconsin. Not just relaying the road, but new bridges. They must be flush with money. As traffic was light, there were no delays. I decided to take the bypass around Minneapolis/St. Paul, and it worked fine until I had major road works before rejoining I94. It was a fairly short delay and nothing after that through Minnesota and North Dakota, with traffic thinning out all the time.
Not much in the way of scenery. Wisconsin and Minnesota are similar in many ways, very agricultural, with probably more woods in the former. One thing is that everything is very green, even in North Dakota. No drought so far this year.
One interesting thing regarding my GPS. I have some set waypoints that are permanent, and used the Mill Creek one to direct me around Minneapolis. Once clear of the city, it suddenly gave me my next checkpoint as 1617 miles, Exit 10 on I405 North. Man, that is some checkpoint distance.
So Bismarck is the overnight stop, and onto Montana tomorrow.

No comments:

Post a Comment