We're bringing a Cessna from Toronto home to Oregon (7S3) in a few weeks, and we're looking for ANY thoughts/suggestions for the Dakotas. Cute towns? Lodges? Cabins? Don't-miss events? We won't be set up for heavy-duty camping -- just tent and sleeping bag. We're also happy to entertain recommendations for Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Montana. (And thanks for the suggestion of Central County in Iola, WI!)
Thanks for the assist! Nine hundred Bravo

Here's my write up if your interested in staying the night or two in WI. From the "Oshkosh 2010" thread.

58Skylane wrote:I was just thinking...........I know it's a little ways to the southeast of Oshkosh (just over an hour drive each way: http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&tab=wl). But Elkhart Lake, WI is a really cool town to stay in.

Airport info: http://airnav.com/airport/KSBM or http://airnav.com/airport/8D1. I'm not sure about rental car/courtesy car availability.

The two hotels that I know of:
The Ostoff Resort http://www.osthoff.com/

Siebkens Resort http://www.siebkens.com/. Siebkens has great food and a great bar next door.

More hotels in Plymouth.

Two more great places to eat in Elkhart Lake:
The Paddock Club http://www.paddockclubelkhartlake.com/. The Hangar Steak is the bomb here!!

Lake Street Cafe http://www.lakestreetcafe.com/.

Another bar with great food (one of the best burgers I've ever had). The Brown Baer at 181 East Rhine Street Elkhart Lake, WI (920) 876-3319

Again, I know it's out of the way for most, but it may be well worth it to some.

I'mjustthewife wrote:We're bringing a Cessna from Toronto home to Oregon (7S3) in a few weeks, and we're looking for ANY thoughts/suggestions for the Dakotas. Cute towns? Lodges? Cabins? Don't-miss events? We won't be set up for heavy-duty camping -- just tent and sleeping bag. We're also happy to entertain recommendations for Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Montana. (And thanks for the suggestion of Central County in Iola, WI!)
Thanks for the assist! Nine hundred Bravo

Dakota's? Cute towns? BWWWWAAAAAAHHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHA North/South Dakota is 375 miles of the flattest table top you ever saw. The Black Hills are it brother.

You'll be going across some interesting country. Here's a route to consider:
Toronto to Wiarton to Cockburn Island to Sault Ste Marie. This will take you along Georgian Bay (to your right) and Lake Huron (to your left), and is particularly pretty when you can see the rock formations on the bottom of both bodies of water. Along the way you'll pass the largest lake on an island in a lake on an island in a lake (not a typo). Ask the controller to point it out to you: they all know about it. The shoreline is really rugged in spots, but you'll see small beautiful sand beaches that look ideal for a floatplane.

Sault Ste. Marie is a great place to stop: you can stay in a hotel directly across from the locks, allowing you to watch all sorts of interesting commercial ships going in both directions. On the Canadian side there is an aviation museum - I've not visited it, but it may be worth a look.

I'm no expert on MN, but I do recall that there are some Supercub expert people in Fergus Falls, MN. The western part of South Dakota is interesting: enormous prairie dog colonies, reservations, Badlands Natl Park, Custer State Park (where the runway runs N/S and the wind always blows E/W), Mount Rushmore. The Custer Battlefield is REALLY interesting when viewed from the air. I highly recommend it early in the morning, when you can make multiple passes overhead without pestering people.

West of Rapid City, in Wyoming, you'll find absolutely huge open pit coal mines. They are so big you could literally descend below the top of the mine and manuever in the pit. Greybull (the old Hawkins & Powers boneyard) is cool. Cody, WY has a great western art museum. From there I'd consider going a little south to pick up the Oregon Trail, and follow that for a while.

I hope you have a great ttrip: it should be really fun!

Eric

Might not be what you're looking for, but I have fond memories of camping on the grass strip in White River, SD when I was flying my Citabria across the country in 2005. Easy walk into the tiny town for $6 breakfast for 2 people with eggs and pancakes, and the retired town sheriff gave us a ride in his truck back to the plane.

I spent a few minutes playing with routing options using the AOPA flight planning software and have these thoughts:
If you follow the Great Circle route from Toronto to 7S3, then visiting Mt Rushmore, Gillette, Greybull, Cody, etc is not a big deviation. But going to the Little Bighorn site (near Crow Agency, MT) would be well out of your way. The Oregon Trail would be a little bit out of the way (south of your route), but not a huge deviation. One of the downsides to this route is that it would take you over big parts of Lake Huron and Lake Michigan.

If you choose to minimize your time over open water and decide to fly up to Sault Ste. Marie, then Little Bighorn is pretty much along the way. The route would look like this: CYYZ - CYVV - CYZE - KANJ - KFAR - F02 - 7S3.

I think you will have a lot of fun regardless of the route you take. Keep us posted as your trip unfolds.

Eric

I Wife

If you go around the south end of Lake Michigan, try Amana Colonies (C11) for a meal. Short walk into town - like 1/4 mile. Most restaurants are kinda family style German food. Window shop and buy "Stuff". Grass strip but no fuel - used to be cheap gas in the area within 50 or so miles. Maybe permissible to camp, I don't know, and they used to leave the door unlocked to the pilot lounge/office/bathroom. Not particularly cheap food, but not outrageous.

Custer State Park 3VO

Overnighted there on my way to Oregon from Wisconsin. Stayed at Custer Game Lodge, they will come pick you up and drive you through the buffalo herd.

Wall SD...flyin, walk into town..the famous Wall Drug has about everything. Cody WY..west entrance to Yellowstone. Polson MT located on Flathead Lake..camped there in '08 on the airport, two courtesy cars to take you into town.
HC

Ya know folks, sometimes the PEOPLE you meet in these places are the real gift.... There are a LOT of really nice people in the Dakotas. Spend some time in the Badlands, go to the dinner theater at Medora, visit Hatten, restored home of Carl Ben Eielson, the first aviator in Alaska, etc, etc. Lots of the airports in this part of the world have courtesy cars, and COURTESY is a pretty common denominator in most of the Dakotas and Montana.

Stop by Crookston, MN on your way. Great little airport, good gas prices, courtesy cars (city owned ex police interceptors--wannabes can drive a real cop car).

Oh, yeah, and for restaurants, we got a Big M Supper Club.....

MTV

These are ALL great suggestions and I thank each one of you for your thoughts (and humor). Keep 'em coming! We'll be taking care of 900 Bravo for three or four years, so we'll be contributing to this site plenty in the near future. Don't forget the pancake breakfast next Saturday at 7S3.

Peace Gardens, 30 miles north of Dunseith, north dakota with a grass strip right accross the road.

Here are a few suggestions for ND, big and small towns. You’re from Portland therefore every town here is small.

Upcoming fly-ins, you could camp at any of these and some one there will take to into town and back if you want. Scroll to the bottom of the page.
http://www.ndac.aero/events.htm

Otherwise, Minot Intl, KMOT, has a small but real good aviation museum on the airport. You can walk across the highway to two good hotels and three restaurants.
http://www.dakotaterritoryairmuseum.com/
I was there a few weeks ago and they currently have a beautiful WWII Japanese zero on loan from Fargo.

Peace Gardens north of Dunseith were already mentioned. Great place to spend a couple hours literally smelling the roses. Airstrip is on the border.
http://www.peacegarden.com/

There are a lot of small towns, populations of 100 to 1000. They are all friendly and if you call ahead to the airport manager, they will take care of you for transportation and fuel.

Washburn, 5C8, has a nice airport but no fuel. However, Washburn has a great bed and breakfast, The Devonshire House. The airport is four miles north of town, but she’ll get you there. Tour the Lewis and Clark interpreter center and fort Mandan, both just west of Washburn. Lewis and Clark spent the winter of 1804/1805 here with the Indians and its worth seeing.
http://www.lewisandclarktrail.com/secti ... /index.htm

You could go to Bismarck, contact Bismarck Aero Center, http://bismarckaero.com/ . If you buy fuel from them they will take care of you. Spend the night in Bismarck and eat supper at Pirogue Grille, http://www.piroguegrille.com/ . They have locally raised beef and lamb and top notch service, no dress code, go as you are. Pirogue could be Bismarck’s parallel to Jakes in downtown Portland.
Go up to the capital building and tour the Heritage center http://history.nd.gov/exhibits/heritagecenter.html You can walk through it in a couple of hours or spend three to four hours and really do it justice. It is a real life history of ND from prehistoric to present time.
Also in the Bismarck Mandan area is Fort Lincoln and the Custer house. http://www.fortlincoln.com/ This is where General George Custer kept the 7th Cavalry.

Already mentioned but Medora and the Medora musical is a must see.
http://www.medora.com/
They don’t have an airport and hard to describe where to land there, so land at Dickinson, http://www.dickinsonairport.com/ , rent a car and stay the night in Medora, at the Roosevelt. Eat at Theodore’s and take in the musical. It’s a night to remember.

Just a few options, have fun

Bill

When in North Dakota, since you are from Portland, you could stop and see Portland, ND--I happen to live there. I can get you a car to check out the Carl Ben Eielson museum. It is about a dozen miles from our strip.

Fargo, ND has a neat museum, right on the field at FAR. Within a block of the museum are an Applebees, Buffalo Wild wings, Taco Bell, Burger King, and a couple of hotels.

Bill hit lots of the good spots, let us know if you are coming by

Lance