Thief River Falls, Minnesota

 

The librarian in Northome advised me to take the long route to Thief River Falls rather than the  direct route through the Red Lake Indian Reservatiin as she said it was dangerous with a high level of alcoholiiism and drug use and gun play.  She never drives through it.  I had been looking forward to sampling life in Minnesota’s largest reservation with a population of 5,500, especially since it skirted Red Lake, the largest lake in Minnesota. So she couldn’t discourage me.

The Reservation included two towns of more than a thousand residents, Redby and Red Lake, just five miles apart.  One offered a full-fledged supermarket/“trading post.”  When I pulled up an older guy with a gray pony tail and lavender neckerchief around his neck warmly greeted me and asked where I was headed and where I had started. He said a cyclist from Chiczgo had passed through a couple years ago.

As I checked the deli department still wearing my helmet a woman commented, “It’s a bit cold to be cycling isn’t it?”  And when I returned to my bike another woman asked where I was headed and where I’d come from.  These were the warmest, friendliest folk I’d encounter on this trip with kindly, unhardened features. it was a pleasure to be submerged into this community, where I was the lone Anglo.  

Even the dogs were friendly.  I had one follow me for a couple of miles as if to look after me.  He even plopped down beside me when I paused to take a photo.  I had a most peaceable thirty mile ride through the reservation.  What little traffic there was displayed no ill.  No one tried to run me off the road or speed close by. There is no private property on the reservation, all is communally owned.  The Reservation administers three casinos and also generates revenue through logging snd commercial walleye fishing in the lake. 

The homes were very modest, small box like dwellings and a few mobile homes here and there.  Alcoholism is indeed an issue, as there were signs along the road endorsing the reservation’s policy of no alcohol.  Besides a quart of chocolate milk I left the Reservation with a red neckerchief, just the second I’ve come upon in these travels.

The predicted snow burst forth in light flurries throughout the day with the temperature hovering around freezing.  I wore the nearby-duty, insulated snow pants for the first time on the bike I’d bought a couple weeks ago when my sleeping was stolen and I needed reinforcements while I slept.  They were quite warm, not allowing any heat to escape from my legs.  They kept the blood plenty warm flowing to my feet.  I was glad to have them.  They kept me so warm I had to shed a layer on top and slightly unzip my jacket, as I generated a sweat for the first time in days.  

After the second town on the reservation it was seventy miles of nothing until Thief River Falls.  I was hoping to make it by nightfall for my first motel in over two weeks so I could have a shower and charge all my batteries.  It’d been two weeks before I’d even fully charged my iPad and my five batteries were nearly all drained. My generator hub can’t keep up despite putting in seven hours a day on the bike.

After I turned west after twenty miles of heading north along Red Lake a strong head wind slowed me to under nine miles per hour.  It was forty-three mikes to a motel and I had six hours to make it.  I tried to keep my rest and fueling breaks short, but the wind was sapping my energy and slowing me to seven miles per hour for stretches.  I was so looking forward to a motel that I was prepared to ride in the dark, but as the light prematurely waned thanks to a thick cloud cover and the flurries turning into genuine, wet, fluffy flakes of snow that began soaking my pants I had to abort and get into my tent but fast.  I was fortunate there was a nearby forest as after the lake the trees gave way to pastures and large farmsteads, mostly hay, but some corn and cattle as well. I fell eleven miles short of my goal. 

I used my candle for the first time to generate some extra warmth in the tent, though I knew it would be of little use in drying any of my outer layers.  I had been so intent on making it to town, I hadn’t submerged my ramen in water, which I need to do at least an hour before I want to eat it in this cold weather, so the ramen came late after a couple of peanut butter sandwiches and cereal in applesauce.

The road was clear in the morning, just a little wet.  I stopped at the Walmart to stock up on supplies.  I was able to spread out my soaked tent alongside the vending machines by a side entrance that few people use.  It was also able to start drying my gloves and booties and socks and do a little charging before venturing to the Carnegie Library.  No one protested my presence.  A Native American even handed me a five dollar bill.

The Carnegie had no columns but it was still an exemplary example of the genre, a fortress of a building with extra ornamentation here and there to enhance its bearing.  It is now the town’s Chamber of Commerce, with the new library across the street.  

And with it I could celebrate completing another state.  It was the twenty-second Carnegie I had visited in Minnesota on this trip.   Forty-eight of the sixty-six remain.  I had gotten to the other twenty-six on previous trips.  Now it’s over to North Dakota for three more before catching a train in Fargo home.