This state is the least visited in America, with abandoned homes and “ghost” towns everywhere (Image: Getty)
Every time I meet an American, I always want to tell them: “I lived there!”
“Oh, where?” They always say they politely ignore the fact that 300 million other people can say the same thing.
And when I tell them where I lived, their next question is always “Why?”
That's not really surprising as I used to live in America's least visited state. Despite being twice as large as Scotland, fewer people live throughout the state than average sized British cities.
However, it is not empty. It's definitely frozen too. It's so cold that the British really can't understand. Coldness, like cold, is crushed in the ground like ice when poured through a window on the second floor. Anyway, it's winter. In the summer it's hotter than you get in the UK.
North Dakota is an extreme place, with winter temperatures reaching Antarctica-like (Image: Getty)
I know what you're thinking: this place is not authentic, I'm making it up. Well, I'm not. North Dakota is very realistic and very unique. It should be much better known than that. Certainly, other places get life-threatening cold, others get painfully hot. But not so many places are at extreme, but most are empty, but mostly composed of roads with prairies, small towns, ghost towns, roads with cars abandoned upside down on the side of the road, with as many cars as they drive the right way.
It's a truly amazing place. I only lived for six months a long time ago, but it will always be a part of me. In another life, I lived there, and I went to winter and spent the winter through a few feet thick ice. It was drilled with an industrial-sized drill I had in a giant pickup truck parked next to the lake (yes, actually on the lake). Then I spent the summer watching cowboys on horseback Lasso livestock in a small town rodeo and eating corn dogs at county fairs.
You can stand in the frozen lake of North Dakota in the winter and even park (Image: Getty)
I was lucky (yes, fortunately) and I ended up being there during a severe cold winter. Even North Dakotan was shocked at how cold it was. It reached -44°F (-42°C) in January. For context, the worst journey in the world, a memoir by Apsley Cherry Garrard of Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova Expedition in 1922 says that the temperatures handled were in the range of -70°F (-57°C) with temperatures ranging from -40°F (-40°C) (-40°C).
Just a few months later, in the same place, I took a photo of a car thermometer showing a temperature of 117°F (47°C). In fact, North Dakota's low and high temperature records both reached -60°F (-51°C) in February 1936, and 121°F (49°C) (49°C) (49°C) in five months (a temperature swing of 180°F or 100°C in five months).
In summer, temperatures in North Dakota can go well above 100°F (Image: Getty)
North Dakota's Great Plains Tornado Super Cell, Extreme Land (Image: Getty)
In the 21st century, of course, even at this extreme temperature, I was never in danger. We could rely on heating, air conditioning, cars, homes, phones and even strange gas stations. But this was once the frontier of America. There, people came on foot, were pulled by horses and cows, searching for the land in a small square that they had sold and bought in American dreams.
And even in the 21st century, I was the only person I saw walking somewhere outside. The stranger stopped to ask if it was okay to just walk along the pavement.
In 2025, North Dakota has one of the fastest growing populations in the United States, with about 800,000 people living there today. The growing oil industry is partly responsible. But when I lived there, when there was a distinction that it was America's least visited nation, it was much less. Despite the relative population boom, it remains one of the least populated states in America, with around 11 people across every square mile (the UK has 745 people per square mile).
North Dakota has several abandoned houses, churches and towns (Image: Getty Images)
Many of these towns occurred in the early 20th century and faced several challenges (Image: Getty Images)
It's also the realm of incredible beauty – these are the Badlands (Image: Getty)
But even with the extreme weather and isolation that stand out the most, there is a lot I can vividly remember about my time in North Dakota. I visited an abandoned town, the subject of local rumors that members of the army at a major air base nearby had been handed over by demon worshipers and had taken a very long detour to avoid going nearby.
I went to rodeo, county fairs, and Native American reservations and followed the steps of the famous American explorers Lewis and Clark, who traveled from St. Louis to the Pacific Ocean from St. Louis via North Dakota in the early 19th century.
I walked through the Badlands, where the Bison roamed freely around me and I'm sure there's a lucky escape from some wolves that to this day either I didn't see me or for some reason decided not to try to eat me.
Bison Wade on the River in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota (Image: Getty)
I was walking along the shores of the giant Lake Sakakawia, not far from the size of a large London. I wandered into small bars in small towns miles from anywhere, talking to strangers other than friendly, kind and welcoming. When I drifted the car, one group of people were running around over the snow (like a jet ski for snow).
The most famous thing that comes out of North Dakota is probably Fargo of the state (and subsequent series) and is named after the state's largest town. But I think it should be well known for more.
