Camping and Fishing

After we left the Ranch, we spent another enjoyable week at Audubon Lake with Kathy and Milt. The guys went fishing and had a good haul, while the girls went visiting and shopping. Of an evening, the four of us played dominoes for hours. The second-last Sunday in June found us back on the road and heading south to join Avalyn and Wes at Beaver Bay on the Missouri River, about an hour south of Bismarck. Due to the  mild winter, crops are ripening earlier than usual, and it was a surprise to see the canola almost ready to harvest. Before we left the campground, Frieda and Lenny called in to visit for a while on their way to McClusky for a family get together. Their grandson has won a scholarship to Harvard and they had just been to visit him the day before - they will miss him when he moves to Cambridge.

Milt and Murray with their day's catch at Audubon

Bright yellow canola field - pity it was overcast!

 We then drove to Bismarck and met Irene for lunch and enjoyed our time with her. By 3pm we were on the road to Beaver Bay, and as luck would have it, who should be right behind us but Avalyn and Wes - Wes pulling their big new Pinnacle 40 ft camper, and Avalyn was towing their boat. 

Wes pulling new 5th wheel with Avalyn behind towing their boat

Turn right at the brown sign and you enter Beaver Bay

Beautiful bucolic view across the water (for you Gem)

View out of our RV door 

The campground at Beaver Bay is lovely and quiet during the week, and we have been enjoying evening walks to see the wildlife. Deer, squirrels and rabbits on the ground, and all kinds of birds in the air. We play dominoes until 9.30pm then take a 2 km walk which is out to the entrance gate and back. The sun doesn't set until around 10pm, and it is still light for another 30 minutes after that. The weather was a bit blustery the first few days, so the guys worked on sorting out a few bugs in Wes and Avalyn's brand new 5th wheel camper rather than take the boat out fishing. The satellite TV wiring was all wrong and they had no signal, so Murray was able to get up on their roof and sort that out for them. Filling out warranty paperwork has been another little job they have taken care of. However they made the most of the first fishing day and had the boat in the water by 9am. 

Wes with the best catch of the day

We broke up another day by driving 20 minutes down to check out our next campground and pick out our campsite. Then another day we drove 10 minutes into the nearby town of Linton for lunch and checked out the hardware and drug (chemist) stores both of which had shelves of interesting gifts. The cafe had an unusual version of potato fries, so I took a photo to share with you. They were crispy and crunchy - very nice. Yes, I hear you, loaded with calories too!

Note the unusual fries on the top right of the plate. 

White tail bunnies everywhere

4' snake crosses our path during our walk

Saw the deer each evening around 9.30 pm

While it was wonderful camping right beside the river, the downside of these remote camping areas is that we have no cell phone signal at all, but thankfully our Verizon internet has service - albeit a very, very, very slow download speed.