Day 14: Floating the Missouri River and a Tour of Bismarck

Another early start. After a quick bagel breakfast with Devin and Ginny, during which Devin attempted to make espresso with a broken machine (no luck, resulting in another steamer), I hopped in the car and headed east: destination Bismarck. I only made a brief stop in the Badlands (Medora, ND), where the gas station attendants were amused by my inability to operate an old-fashioned gas pump. 

The Badlands, with bugs on the window

The confusing gas pump

My friend Ruthie, who I met in the Bay Area a few years ago, grew up in Bismarck and just moved back home a few weeks ago. Her family lives next to the Missouri River. I tried to find the house using Google maps, to no avail – there were a few forks in the dirt road that Google hasn't creepily figured out yet, so Ruthie kindly gave me good ol’fashioned directions. I set up my tent in the yard and chatted with her young nephew about Legos. 

Tent in the yard near the Airstream that Ruthie is renovating

Ruthie and I went for a short but beautiful paddle along the river, putting in next to the house and paddling upstream until the thunderclouds became more ominous. 

A side channel of the Missouri River that passes near Ruthie's house

Her brother shared some fresh pesto pasta with us before we headed into town to feed her friend’s cute dog. Just as we were preparing to pick Jeff up at the airport he texted, “I just landed… in Denver.” Apparently his flight was unable to pressurize the cabin air, resulting in an immediate return to Denver. Naturally, a flood of logistics unveiled in which he would be re-routed to Fargo the next morning. This would let me make more progress on the road-trip and allow us to pick up the rental kayak on time on Saturday. Jeff was later informed that while he could not be re-booked on the next flight to Bismarck (a couple hours later), his suitcase was on its way to Bismarck. Since this was apparently inflexible, he negotiated with the agents to let me pick up the bags in Bismarck.

In the mean time, Ruthie took me on a lovely tour of downtown Bismarck. We stopped for beers at the Laughing Sun Brewing Company, where I sipped a strawberry ale and she tried the brown ale. On the way home we stopped in at the old train station (bottom right photo), which was converted into a mexican restaurant when passenger trains stopped passing through Bismarck. We stopped into the local record store to say hi to Ruthie's friends before returning home.

Date: August 1st, 2014

Distance: 1.5 miles

Time: ~30 mins