Monday, August 20, 2018

We are in Spearfish, South Dakota.  We’re not supposed to be here, but when we left Spearfish on Saturday and headed for Custer, South Dakota, the truck had other ideas.  About 15 miles out of town, headed up a hill, the truck flashed a message “cutting power” and did.  Steve managed to get us mostly off the road and we looked at each other.

We had some trouble with the DEF (diesel exhaust fluid) distribution mechanism last year around this time.  The truck had given us a similar message, except it said cutting power in 99 miles. We were camped in a town with a Chevy dealer, and while it took a few days, it was all repaired relatively quickly and we went on our way.

Luckily, Saturday we had cell service and I found that the nearest Chevy dealer was back in Spearfish. While Steve worked with Good Sam Roadside Service checking on a tow, 3 different people stopped by to help.  One checked under the hood for loose hoses; he’d had trouble with one that morning.  And another suggested turning the engine off for a while, which we did. I called the campground we had stayed at the night before to get us a space for the night.

After a bit, we turned the engine on to see if we could at least get completely off the road. The check engine light was still on, but the warning message was gone, so we tried to get to someplace we could turn around and head back to the campground.  We made it back to the campground without any problem.  By now it was Saturday afternoon and the service department closed at noon and would open again Monday morning.

We had a restful Sunday and got some laundry done.  Monday, bright and early, Steve had the truck at the Chevy dealer.  The DEF system was fine.  The message occurred because the turbo charger was over pressure and then under pressure, so the computer shut everything down.  They ran a series of checks and couldn’t find anything to fix. We’ll watch everything on the way home, but should be good.

We’ll skip our stay in Custer this trip and resume our trip home on Wednesday.  We should be home by August 28th.

Before we left the north section of Theodore Roosevelt National Park last week, I did get a picture of the Little Missouri River that runs through all sections of the park.

We spent 2 and half days in the south section of Theodore Roosevelt National Park and really enjoyed our time.  We camped in the town of Medora, which pretty much surrounds the national park entrance. 

The scenery in the south section of the park was very like the north section – colored layers of odd shaped hills.

But we had more luck with animals in the south section.  First we saw wild horses.

We saw a total of 6 wild horses on our drive through the park, always in pairs.

We came across a large herd of bison.

The bison were totally ignoring their audience.

And last, we saw hundreds of prairie dogs.  This one let me get a good picture of him.

We never found any big horn sheep this summer at all, which was a disappointment.  

The town of Medora, where we were camped, was quite interesting.  It has a permanent population of 112, but is quite the bustling tourist town in the summer.  It was founded in 1883, about the same time that Roosevelt visited.  The founder was a French nobleman Marquis de Mores. He named the town Medora, after his wife.  His plan was to grow cattle in North Dakota, slaughter it and ship it to Chicago in refrigerated train cars (refrigeration provided by ice).  He built his meat packing company, but hadn’t planned on the Chicago beef people (who shipped live cattle to Chicago and fattened them on corn before slaughter) teaming up with the railroads to thwart his business plans.  He and his wife left Medora after three years.

But his impact on the town is still evident.  The town is neatly laid out according to his plan.  Several buildings from that time remain.  One is the small Catholic Church that his wife commissioned.  The brick maker for that church also built a home for Medora’s parents and the chimney for the meat processing plant.  All three still stand and the bricks seem pristine. 

One of the other buildings that remains is the home the Marquis built for himself.  The Marquis and his wife, Medora, considered it a hunting lodge, while the locals called it the Chateau.   While large, with 10 bedrooms, it is a plain white building with a red roof, sitting on a hill overlooking the Marquis land.  (Steve and I managed not to take a picture of it.) The de Mores took their square grand piano with them when they left, but left the other furnishings.  It remained in the family until it was given to the state in 1936.  Most of the original furnishings are still in the house, which is quite unusual.

Medora has managed to survive in spite of its small size.  The small town decided to put on a show to commemorate the 100th birthday of Theodore Roosevelt in 1958.  It was staged in a local natural amphitheater.  It and a succeeding show struggled for several years before Harold Schaefer bought the amphitheater.  He was president of the Theodore Roosevelt National Memorial Park and Badlands Association, and founder of the Gold Seal corporation (anyone remember Mr. Bubble?).  He poured money and talent into the production.  Today it manages to draw over 100,000 people during the summer season. The Schaefer family gave the amphitheater to the Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation in 1986.

The foundation runs many things around town.  The RV park we stayed in belongs to the foundation and they are responsible for the community pool, playgrounds and parks.  This was one of the most imaginative playgrounds I’ve seen.  It resembles an old west town and the kids all flock to it.

Medora also holds a “Pitchfork Steak Fondue” buffet dinner before each performance.  It is a unique experience and actually tastes quite good.  Most of the attendees to the performance attend the dinner, so it’s a good money maker. And everyone takes pictures of the steaks being cooked.

For a small town, its working it’s tail off to stay alive and doing a good job of it.

Deb

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

We are camped just outside Theodore Roosevelt National Park, in Medora, North Dakota.  This National Park is divided into 3 sections: the north section, the south section and the Elkhorn Ranch section.  We stayed in the campground of the north section Monday night.  A lot of national parks have campgrounds, but most of the parks do not have campgrounds with hookups (i.e. water, electric and sewer).   Since we have batteries, some solar, and are self-contained, we can go a few days without hookups without a problem.  This campground also had no phone service, so we were really off the grid.

As we drove into the campground, this bison greeted us.

We were delighted to see him and hoped it was a good omen for our visit.  But he was the first and last animal we saw in the north section of the park.

Our campsite was a pull-thru, meaning we didn’t have to back into the space, making parking easier.  Steve positioned the trailer so this was the view out our back window.

Not our prettiest view, but it’s always nice to not be looking at other trailers.  What you can’t see is the Little Missouri River that’s about 25 yards away.   It’s about 8 foot lower, so we couldn’t see it from the trailer.

Theodore Roosevelt National Park was created to honor President Theodore Roosevelt, who was the first president to champion conservation.  He originally came out here in the fall of 1883 on a hunting trip and fell in love with this strange area.  He bought a ranch and invested in cattle.  He then returned to his home in New York for the winter.  (The ranger who gave us a tour of his cabin told us that “nobody wants to be here in the winter.”)  Unfortunately, on February 14,1884, Roosevelt lost both his wife (kidney failure after childbirth) and his mother (typhoid fever).  He returned to Montana to mourn and heal.  He bought and built his second ranch, Elkhorn, which is part of the park today.  He got out of the cattle business when the winter of 1886-87 wiped out most of his cattle.

But his experiences in Montana influenced him for the rest of his life.  Wikipedia states “Roosevelt established the United States Forest Service, signed into law the creation of five National Parks, and signed the 1906 Antiquities Act, under which he proclaimed 18 new U.S. National Monuments. He also established the first 51 bird reserves, four game preserves, and 150 National Forests, including Shoshone National Forest, the nation's first. The area of the United States that he placed under public protection totals approximately 230,000,000 acres (930,000 km2).[143]

Roosevelt extensively used executive orders on a number of occasions to protect forest and wildlife lands during his tenure as President.[144] By the end of his second term in office, Roosevelt used executive orders to establish 150 million acres of reserved forestry land.”

Shortly after his death in 1919, sites were looked at for a park site.  The Civilian Conservation Corps had camps in both of the current park sites and built structures, roads and trails still in use today.  After years of various designations, (Roosevelt Recreation Demonstration Area, then Theodore Roosevelt National Wildlife Refuge among others), it officially became a national park in 1978.  It is the only national park named after an individual.

The park has the geography usually described as badlands, surrounding the valley created by the Little Missouri River.  Most of the time, I felt like I was driving through a Star Wars set.

The pictures really don’t do justice to the strangeness of the landscape, all surrounding a lazy river bordered by cottonwood trees and grassy pastures.

We’re off to explore the south section.

Deb