The day started out well, but went downhill rapidly after lunch.
We departed Moon Lake fairly early for another drive on dirt roads until we hit the paved two-lanes. Tom says it felt like we crossed half of Nebraska on dirt roads (in reality it was about 40 miles out of 200 North to South). More rocks playing the crossbars on our doomed leveling system.
Just after we crossed from Nebraska to South Dakota we entered Wewela, South Dakota – population 5 according to the sign (and per Wikipedia in 2019.) Not sure the 5 people still live there, but the first town we saw with a single digit population.
Our first stop was the South Dakota Tractor Museum – and More! – in Kimball, South Dakota. This seemed to be about halfway to our destination campground. We got a personal tour from one of the senior staff – a very nice and knowledgeable lady who grew up using several of the items on exhibit. We saw a one room schoolhouse that they had moved with a haystack mover 15 miles to the exhibit. Highly recommend if you are in the area.
One our way down the road on an undisclosed two-lane highway with no shoulder the alarm for our leveling system went off. We pulled over as far as possible, and Tom sent Scott to investigate while he tried to pull the system back up. Scott shouted in alarm as we spewed large amounts of hydraulic fluid all over the road – though we had apparently been leaving a trail for some time. After a few quarts (or gallons) of hydraulic fluid vented from the system from a leak we never found, we determined that the legs are apparently on springs to keep them retracted in cases like these. The alarm kept going off, though – and rather than do the intelligent thing and disconnect the alarm, Scott insisted that we simply turn up Bruce Springsteen radio on Sirius/XM to an ear-splitting level to almost drowned it out, and drive 3 ½ hours to the campground. It was so nerve-racking that it almost kept Scott from his daily nap in the passenger seat. Really disappointing in a camper that cost 6 figures and for which the warranty just expired.
Our next stop was Duluth, MN, so we called Dave Phillips there and he has lined up someone to try and repair the system. We are grateful.
At the campground we determined that the fuse box did not have a label for the leveling system, so Tom removed the panel and we disconnected the two cables that powered the system. This stopped the incessant chiming while on the road. The County Line campground in Summit, SD seemed unremarkable. On checking in Tom reported that they would make Pizzas, but there were no remaining restaurants in town other than a truck-stop Subway. We didn’t believe that, but unhooked the jeep and confirmed they were right. We then ate leftover hamburgers again. Tom reported that they had live acoustic music, so we listened to 6 local musicians jamming on guitar, violin, and banjo for an hour or so after dinner – they were good! Then a restful sleep in the sometimes-rocking, unstabilized Khan.
