North Dakota oil patch camping

[mustangcats]

I will be traveling through North Dakota in a couple of weeks and was wondering how hard it will be to find a camping spot. I've been reading reports that the big oil boom has created a huge housing shortage and the campgrounds are filled with the oil workers. My planned route will take me from Minot to Williston and then west on highway 2 through Montana and an overnight stay will put me somewhere around Williston. Anyone been through this area lately that can share their first hand experiences?

[S. Heisley]

Be careful in Williston and areas nearby. I've heard that, with the oil boom, lawlessness similar to the old, Wild West has become the norm. Road repair and traffic signals, etc have not kept up with the influx of new-to-the-area people and the oil boom; thus, traffic accidents abound. Word has spread from person to person to tell women not to go out alone at night, as the number of rapes have increased to the point that they don't even bother to report them anymore. I'm told that the police can't keep up with all the problems and they don't publicize everything. Also, just finding a bed in a communal bunkhouse is difficult and costly at best.

I don't have information for camping in North Dakota; but will email a friend who is from that area and see what I can find out. I don't know about Minot. It may be okay(?). However, if you can avoid Williston, I would. Here is some information for surrounding states:

Montana: www.campingmontana.com
South Dakota: www.campsd.org
Minnesota: www.hospitalitymn.com

[High Desert]

I have a friend in Minot and he says it's not as bad as Williston, but still busy. Can you reset your schedule enough to get you over into Montana on that day? Or stay south of Hwy 2 on SR 23 and end up around Sydney MT, only about an hour longer. The farther south you are the less busy it is. May be easier that way, booms towns can be an experience not all would care for. Just a thought.

[Engineer Guy]

As ~30,000 Acres of BLM Parcels near us in CO almost went up for Lease Auction for Gas Exploration, including Hydrofracking, I hit the 'Net hard recently to read up on all aspects of Gas/Oil Exploration effects. What I read applies to much of the Bakken Gas Field under several States, and the Dakotas.

In a nutshell, as mentioned above, it is very much 'The Wild West', and in ways that were both astonishing, but 'logical'. But, in an odd 'Supply and Demand' way.

If you have a pulse, you can pretty much drive into Town and start making >$60k/year even driving Supply Trucks. Some Towns have limited local Land Owners to renting space on their Ranches to 'just' 3 Hook Up Spaces so as to not overload Water and Septic Systems. Infrastructure in many places is just out-of-control. One fellow mentioned waiting 1/2 hour just to make a left turn in a formerly-sleepy Town because the line of Heavy Trucks was so long.

A Table at a Restaurant was a 2.5 hour wait. A WalMart was simply setting some items down in the Aisles still on the Pallets. There was no point in wasting time to stock Shelves. Folks snatched items off the Pallets, which emptied in no time; even in the middle of the night.

DUIs at 10:00 in the morning were 'no big deal' anymore. One Log of Sheriff activity over 3 years in one County was something 110 Calls; then 325 Calls; then 1,500 Calls last year. 'Barney Fife'-staffed Sheriff Departments haven't a prayer of keeping up. Also, they can't pay what Oil/Gas Companies do, so they can't staff up as one might expect. One Sheriff Department needed some front end work done on a Cruiser. They were quoted $4K in Town, since a local Garage can charge 'whatever' when fixing Supply Trucks. The Town had to take the Cruiser 80 miles distant to get a reasonable price on the front end work.

Besides the simple lack of Camping Space - and insane rates that Campground Owners can/do get - one distressing issue was the number of Drunks wandering into the wrong House ~1 Block over, and so on. I have to believe this would happen in Campgrounds where relative 'Youngsters' living in Truck Campers have nothing to do after 12 hour Shifts but drink. I'm no Puritan; I'm just trying to pass along my Research dispassionately.

So, fasten your Seatbelt. It's another World up there. That said, 'personal' Recon from Folks on here who know someone 'up there' will be accurate information, I'm sure...

[NathanL]

Some guys who work for me quit and went up there. Most of them wound up coming back. The money was good but $3,500 a month for a 1 bedroom apartment started to wear them down along with 3 hour lines at Wal-Mart buying food.

I don't know the exact details but most of them spent the first month living in the truck if the company they worked for didn't provide a man camp to live in because they couldn't find a spot to park a camper etc...I don't know how far that no vaccancy zone around the oil fields would be however.

If you are going thru Minot you are going thru oil/gas boom central. Guys were talking about 45 minute waits to get thru a 4 way stop.

[S. Heisley]

I just heard back from my friend who is from Williston. She just visited there last fall and says to avoid that area at all costs. She wouldn't even suggest a camp area. She says that the "man camps" are charging $150 a night for a small room with a bed, some food and a communal TV area, if you can even get one of those. Also, she says the traffic is really bad; and, to quote her, "Those trucks will run you over and not even look back." She also said that it sometimes takes 45 minutes to get through an intersection at a stop light.

In short, stay away from the oil boom areas and find another way to get to your destination.

[Bigwoods]

All the above is true. Women are advised not to go shopping alone. It is like the Old Wild West. The trucking companies are bringing their trucks to the eastern side of the state to get serviced as it is quicker and cheaper to shuttle them 5 hours way.

Service places are swamped as regular good workers take jobs in the patch. Housing is crazy and I'm guessing any camping is risky at best and very expensive. A friend of mine is working with an oil company to house workers 5 hours way and he will shuttle crew on a weekly basis to do a week on and week off type of thing.

A ton of money is being poured into housing and infastructure but that will be a while before it helps. The good thing is the state as a surplus in the coffers.

[eamarquardt]

My cousin is there working and living there. He has a trailer that is heavily insulated. No running water (it will freeze in winter when he's not there for 12 hours and not running the generator), and a Honda generator for power. 12 hours on, 12 hours off. I think he works ten days on, ten days off. It's a job! He gets the heck out of there when he's off and travels quite a bit.

My son, who has been working in the oil fields of Santa Barbara County as a production engineer, has considered going up there for a while, but life there is just not as sweet as it is on the Central California Coast.

#2 son, 3 years away from a degree in petroleum engineering, would move there in a heartbeat, after he gets his degree if he could make enough to buy a one ton diesel "dually", ha. He has visions of "sugar plums" when he graduates. I have no doubt he'll succeed at the Colorado School of Mines because of the "sugarplums" at the end of the "rainbow".

Cheers,

Gus

[mustangcats]

Thanks for all the feedback and suggestions, it sounds worse than I could ever have imagined. I have studied the maps, and although there aren't a lot of options to get me to highway 2 in Montana, it looks like the route through Sidney is the best choice. There are a number of state and government facilities that have camping about an hour or so southeast of Sidney in North Dakota. Maybe I could try to make that an overnight stop. I sure am glad I asked before heading out and driving into a nightmare.

BTW: Here is a great site I am using to find potential camping areas. http://www.ultimatecampgrounds.com/

[Wolffarmer]

I was in Williston and areas around it in January 2012 ( business other than oil patch ). I would not plan on stopping any place close to it. The Wallmart parking lot is not just an overnight stay but many looked like they had been there for a much longer time. I saw camping trailers parked in the back of the Applebyee's parking lot and they had been there a long time. Many many farm houses have camping trailers parked cheek and jowl around them. And this is in a part of the country where the winter temps often get down to -30 and -40 for long stretches of time. Imagine living in a camping trailer in that weather. Most of them do have some kind of skirting, No matter how crappy looking.

And it seems that most people are driving the largest pickup they can get. Would probably be a good place to set up a business stretching the frame of a pickup so people can have an even larger one.



If I was to travel through there I would take all security measures allowed by law. While I was there a teacher in near by Montana was raped and killed by one of the oil patch workers and I have heard of others since then. And the locals are well armed in defense.

Randy

[stumphugger]

So where are the anti-crime folks? Why are people putting up with that? I know, $$$$. But it makes me mad to think that being a woman would mark one to be a victim. We try to change that in other countries but let it happen in ours?

I drove through there just before the boom. Highway 2 was uncrowded and people were polite. If I were a native of that area, I'd be protesting and doing whatever I could to stop the crime.

A sad state of affairs.

[Wolffarmer]

The boom happened much faster than the local establishments. Williston's municipal facilities are over taxed, water, sewage, police, fire. They can't grow it fast enough and there is little drinkable water anyway. The highways going through Williston is clogged with semi's and the huge pickups and other service trucks. If you don't really need to go through there I would stay away. But you probably won't have an accident. Now finding parking if you want to grab a bite to eat is another matter. I would say to just keep driving as there is little parking left at restaurants if you are pulling a trailer. Parking lot at Wallmart is usually pretty full, even at night.

And all over that area are what is called "Man Camps". Sort of a modern barracks where they bring in prefabbed rooms and bolt them together for the workers.

New story

You will probably be safe driving through the area. Just expect the place to be very very crowded and really if towing a trailer don't expect to find parking at restaurants. Or if you get a motel room occasionally to clean up it will be hard here on sort notice.

Randy

Randy

[NathanL]

They didn't plan ahead is their biggest problem. I have lived in 3 different places that went thru an oil/gas boom and 2 of them did it right. As soon as they got word on the exploration wells they started informing residents on what to expect, how to actually make money off of it by selling water, building RV spots etc..and passed rules on limiting the number of RV's plugged into the sewer at one spot, limiting how many RV's per acre etc...The last town even sent some of the city council and a newspaper guy on tour of areas that had been hit hard in the boom to find out what they needed to know. Those 2 went 1000x smoother than the one that just sat back and got over run. Done right it's not a big deal.

Finding a hotel could be an issue. In one of the towns I lived in Chesapeake bought 2 of the 3 local hotels for their employes and subcontractors and the 3rd stayed full for 2 years round the clock.

[48Rob]

Not a pleasant story, but seems very related to the oil patch workers...

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/07/09/2- ... latestnews