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Today I needed to get from Duluth, MN to the Northwest Angle of Minnesota and then back down to Fargo_ND.

I started off going up to International Falls, MN and I ate an order of parmesan chicken for lunch at Giovanni’s, great pasta and cheese, but chicken and garlic bread were awesome.

The Northwest Angle is a section of Minnesota that is cut off from the rest of the United States, and so it was necessary to enter Canada to reach it. I’ve been to Canada a few times before and I’ve never had any trouble at the border, but apparently my story of being on a 50 state road trip is crazy enough that they wanted to check my car. On the Canadian side they just looked in the trunk, but coming back on the American side they checked the truck, under the hood, inside the car, etc. Of course I’m not traveling with anything that could get me in trouble, but it was refreshing to see how thorough they were on the American side.

The Northwest Angle itself is an interesting place. Because entering (and leaving) is crossing the border they have customs people, however you are required to go into a booth at “Jim’s Corner” and talk to the customs officers by video phone (they can see you, but you can’t see them) or else you could be subject to massive fines. My main reason for traveling here was part of an effort to reach all four directional extremes of the lower 48 states, and this got me to the most northern point of the lower 48 states.

Going to the Northwest Angle I needed to use a few unpaved roads, but they were in pretty respectible condition, however, on the way back I hear the Garmin Girl say “Turn onto unpaved road in 0.3 miles.” The other roads at least had names, and frankly if the Garmin hadn’t insisted that this was a public road I would have thought that it was a private, poorly maintained driveway. Several times I was sure I would get stuck or bang up something important on the bottom of the car, but luckily I made it through and back on to civilization. Despite the rough roads, Manitoba was really amazing. Most amazingly is that it has a very different feeling than even northen Minnesota, it seemed as though right past the border it was a little more out in the wilderness (but in a good way).

Coming back down to Fargo I stopped at Paradiso Mexican Restaurant and ordered a chicken fajita combo. The chicken and rice were absolutely superb, but the cheesy was kind of soupy. Foods with odd textures weird me out and so I left most of the cheese uneaten, and to make matters worse my waitress disappeared while I was forced to watch my Cleveland Cavs lose to the Orlando Magic. In retrospect I think if I would have ordered something without that cheese I would have been extremely happy with the place, it had a great atmosphere and they obviously knew what they were doing with the chicken and rice. I can’t hold them accountable for the Cavs

Tomorrow I’m headed down to Iowa and Nebraska and then over to Rapid City, SD to put me in a great position to see Mount Rushmore on Tuesday.

Also, pictures tomorrow I promise! But I need to get some sleep because tomorrow will be a long day.

Tags: Big Road Trip