Continuing east across Montana and a new state!

On Saturday, we continued east across Montana, 

...we were on our way to Medora, North Dakota, and decided to break up the trip from Missouri Headwaters State Park to Medora with a stop near Custer, Montana, at The Fort at 49 (exit 49 on I-94). This RV park was listed as a Passport America park, but, as is so often the case, the 1/2 price rates are not valid during popular times of the year (e.g. not available Memorial Day - Labor Day). However, I read reviews of the campground, and while the campground reviews indicated that it was rather ho-hum, just a place to park with full hookups (which was indeed the case - just dried grass with full hookups), the restaurant with the same name was outstanding.

So, we went to the restaurant for supper - Carl got a Mushroom and Swiss Burger and I got Prime Rib -- all was delicious!

A view of the sunset across Big Sky Country.

The front of the restaurant -- there was nothing at all special about the looks of the restaurant, but the food was great!

Another view of the campground - there were 14 "buddy" sites, but since only 4 RVs spent the night Saturday night, no one was "buddied" with us.

Another view of the restaurant as we left on Sunday.

Sunday's journey had us continuing on I-94 across eastern Montana -- lots of hay in fields. This one had just single large round bales, but a couple of fields (that I did not take pictures of) had double round bales - one had them side by side with the flat end next to each other, the other had them with the rounded sides next to each other. Not sure what the advantage would be with putting the bales out two at a time. It was also interesting that the grass along the interstate had been baled into round bales (they were just sitting there by the road - maybe someone is yet to pick them up).

A view as we were driving.

We stopped outside Billings, Montana for fuel -- usually we stop at stations where we get a discount with our TSD card, but there weren't options along I-94 in eastern Montana, so we found a Pilot/Flying J on the east side of Billings. When we pulled around to the fueling area, there were just a couple of trucks at the fuel pumps, and at one spot, a truck in line behind another one at the fueling island - but lots of empty fueling islands. Confused, I drove to one of the empty fueling islands, and, it was indeed, empty - there was a bag over the pump handle indicating "Out of Service". Eventually we found that all of the diesel pumps were out of service. 

I recalled that there was a Pilot/Flying J on the other side of the interstate, so I called them... "Do you have diesel?" 

"Of course we have diesel, we're a truck stop!" 

"I mean, do you actually have diesel available to pump right now - we're across the interstate at your sister station and they have no diesel available to pump." 

"Oh yes, there are a lot of trucks out there."

I didn't say, but I thought, "There are trucks over here too, but they are just washing their windshields..."

So, we went to the station on the other side of the interstate... after waiting about 5-10 minutes for a trucker to finish washing the whole front of his rig (windshield, headlights, turn signals, front grill) while blocking the RV labeled pumps, we finally got Gracie filled with diesel. This was the first time we have encountered a lack of diesel... and it seems really strange that another station of the exact same brand within 1/2 mile away would have fuel and the other not... but we were glad to get fuel and keep on going.

Eventually we crossed into North Dakota (Gracie got another state on her map!) and arrived in Medora, North Dakota.

We're looking forward to seeing several things in and around Medora as we stay here two nights!