14 Aug 2022 - Minot Air Force Base and Dinner at Irish Pub

 14 Aug

This morning I made a short trip to the local Tractor Supply store to top off one of our propane cylinders before heading further west.  They sell propane by the gallon, so we save quite a bit of money that way.

Later we drove north from the town of Minot ND about 10 miles to Minot Air Force Base (AFB), which occupies 5342 acres north of the town of Minot. The missile fields cover 8500 square miles.  Minot AFB opened February 1957 and over the years has hosted various fighter-interceptor aircraft and bombers.  

Kind of an interesting fact about Minot's mission:  "Minot AFB is the only dual-wing nuclear capable base in the Air Force, hosting two legs of the Strategic Triad. The 5th Bomb Wing operates 26 B-52 aircraft, and the 91st Missile Wing operates 150 ICBM (Minuteman III)sites."  The third leg of the nuclear "triad" is nuclear-missile-armed submarines.  They have been on continuous alert operation everyday since June 1968!

We visited the FamCamp and as was reported, the sites are very small.  I can't explain why they would have built the sites this small, unless they are just very old, from the days when travel trailers were relatively small.  I am glad we camped where we camped.  

Your coach cannot extend forward or it would block the road.  In the rear there are trees and other items that may prevent hanging over rearward very far, plus our rear levelers would be in the grass which is less than desirable.

One of the two empty sites.  Very short.

Again we made the obligatory stop at the Exchange, but not the commissary this time.  Since it was Sunday morning, military clothing sales was closed (you would think they would want to be open for their customers..?) 

This afternoon we watched the Cincinnati Reds host the Chicago Cubs and then we headed out to a local Irish Pub for dinner, called Ebeneezer's Irish Pub and Eatery. 

No band playing on Sunday afternoon

We opened things up with a pint of Guinness and Doreen had a "Momma's Lemonade" that was vodka, lemonade and topped with red wine. So I failed at "splitting the G", which refers to taking a substantial enough first gulp from a pint of Guinness that the level of the remaining beer in the glass is directly through the middle of the "G" in the word Guinness, which is printed on the glass.  Looks like I need more practice!!

Doreen had a chicken wrap and I had a traditional Irish Reuben sandwich.  It was monstrous so half of it came back to the RV with us for lunch tomorrow. Probably one of the better and thickest Reubens I've ever had! 

The sun was setting when we got back so we washed both the RV and the truck!  Talk about working off dinner!!  The sun did provide some color over the RV business to the west.

Tomorrow, our last day here, we have a couple places in town to visit and then we will likely make another trip to Minot AFB for Doreen's t-shirt at Military Clothing store.