The Wandering Scot

An occasional travel journal.

Browsing Posts tagged USA

North Dakota: Fargo

I’m in Fargo, North Dakota, where I’ve been participating in Traditional Local Customs. Yes, this is the actual wood chipper used for body disposal in the movie Fargo.  Oh ya, you betcha!  🙂  It’s now the star attraction at the Fargo Visitor Center.  You can bring your own body parts.

I’m in North Dakota, visiting the Ronald Reagan Minuteman Missile Site.  It’ a real (retired) Minuteman control silo. It’s one of several Minuteman sites that were closed down under the START treaty ICBM limits. A giant freight elevator takes you down 52 feet to the command level, then there is a 7 ton blast door […]

New Mexico: Alien Egg Hatchery

New Mexico’s Bisti/De-Na-Zin is a confusing trackless wilderness, but in these days of GPS and downloadable maps, that’s not a big issue. I saw lots of hoodoos, some petrified wood, many weird rocks.  But the main thing I was looking for was the “Cracked Eggs” aka the “Alien Egg Hatchery“.  This is an area with […]

A Botanical Road Trip

I’m on an all-electric road trip through California into Arizona and back. The trip has ended up having a distinctly botanical flavor, including visits to: The Joshua Tree National Park. Indian Canyons, near Palm Springs, with lush palm groves along narrow desert canyons. The Desert Botanical Garden near Phoenix, for an amazing collection of mature […]

I’m doing an all-electric road trip across California into Arizona. I’ve got delayed a little in Yuma, Arizona, at the Yuma Territorial Prison – apparently there was a problem with my paperwork when I bought my admission ticket. I’m sure it will all be fixed soon, but if someone could bake me a cake in […]

California: Nike Missile Site

The Nike Missile Site in the Marin Headlands, just North of San Francisco, is the sole preserved site from a giant 1950s era US national anti-aircraft defense system.  This site was one of six defending San Francisco, using nuclear tipped anti-aircraft missiles so they could reliably take down incoming Soviet nuclear bombers.  Gulp. On the […]