Everybody has been super super helpful!
We went to pay the owner turned around and said "it's on me"!
The guys at Scott Peterson Motors here they didn't charge us for the service!
Okay
I'm not expected to get this right first time!
We're Marianne and Chris
in 2018 we quit the nine to five and bought Trudy our camper van.
We are currently on an adventure to drive the circumference of the world!
Well all I can say is we've woken up and it's very blowy !
There is a weather warning today for wind,
but it's not going to stop us, no no no!
We have a very exciting destination today!
We are heading to the Devil's Tower
The door just got blown open by the wind and I nearly went flying!
The sun is beautiful today, but boy is it windy!
I'm not sure wearing a baseball cap is a good idea today, I think I'll lose it!
Right let's hit the road, I'm super excited to visit due to the mystery that surrounds it!
I can't wait to see it!
Well the wind's blowing up the dust today,
it looks Smoky but it's not it's all the dust blowing across the road!
There is some big industrial plant here I think it is some kind of mining or ... ?
We just spotted a couple of the nodding donkeys, the oil pumps,
we haven't seen those for a while, so they must have oil in Wyoming as well? or maybe it's drawing gas out? I'm not sure...
So when you come to these kind of places, you never quite know what to expect,
We've seen the devil tower on movies, we've seen it on documentaries like The Unexplained it was featured,
and this huge Pinnacle of rock, we've got 17 miles to go and we can't see it yet,
and we're hoping it's going to be as big and dramatic as they say it is!
The landscape that we were expecting from what we've seen online it really flat with this protruding Mass,
but it seems quite hilly!
Okay we're turning off, it's about 10 miles over there, but we still can't see it yet!
Oh we're just getting a first glimpse of it, over there!
Oh it is an old shape!
Oh it is windy, the door !!
I nearly lost the door !
So here you go! This is the Devil's Tower!
Absolutely amazing,
I remember this Tower from the famous movie - Close Encounters of the Third Kind
If you haven't seen it, you should definitely watch it!
It adds a bit of mystery to this Tower,
which they don't actually know how it was created.
Scientists can't quite figure it out!
The Devil's Tower is 1267 feet tall, or 386 meters!
It sits above the Belle Fourche river.
It's sacred to over 20 Native American tribes.
It was designated as the U.S First National monument in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt because it was an object of scientific interest.
It gets over half a million visitors a year,
and some of them come here to do rock climbing.
It's called Devil's Tower because Richard Dodge who was a military escort for a scientific Expedition into the Black Hills,
journaled that the local indigenous people called this place 'bad Gods Tower'
which loosely got translated into the Devil's Tower.
So apparently rock climbers that have climbed to the top of devil Tower,
say that on the top there are actually grasses, Cactus and there's some Wildlife,
things like rats, Chipmunks and even snakes!
How did they get up there?
Well that was absolutely amazing and definitely one of my bucket list places ticked off! - Close Encounters a big fan of that movie!
If you've seen it let me know I think it came out in 1979? 1980? But you should definitely go check it out if you haven't seen it?
I have a confession ! oh you haven't seen it? No - I haven't seen it! I feel a Netflix night coming on Marianne!
This is a fun little town we're just driving through here, look! fine arts and antiques
There's an old Trading Post,
I think you just imagine this kind of place to be in somewhere in Texas?
The old Bank look with the the skull on the front.
Welcome to Aladdin - population 15,
and apparently this town has something a little bit special that we're going to stop at as we're driving through,
Your destination is on the left !
There you go, we are here!
I think this is it or is this somebody's house?!
Oh no this is it!
This is it!
So back in the day
the town of Aladdin, it was a it was a mining town it had a population of about 500 people
like I said nowadays it's only got 15.
But this is the remnants of an old Tipple!
It was actually used in coal mining
and to sort the coal - the coal would be shoved down the Chute at the top,
and there would be grills and grates with buckets underneath that would collect the peanut sized ones,
the egg size pieces and the larger pieces, and it would all be sorted by the Tipple
It's a fascinating piece of history and apparently one of the last remaining relics of the coal industry in this area!
Based on today's weather forecast with strong winds and weather warnings
and snow forecast, who knows it looks like it could fall down at any time,
maybe we will be one of the last people to see it standing!
Welcome to South Dakota, we are just arriving in South Dakota and we've got a few things to do whilst we're here,
we're heading to the nearby town of Belle Fourche - I think that's how you pronounce it,
because Trudy's got some minor repairs that she needs doing which will show you,
and also we've taken advantage of one of Marianne's sisters Sue's friends addresses to get a package delivered!
Oh yes thanks Sue!
Welcome to Belle Fourche, we are just arriving into town,
and the first stop we're looking for is an RV repair shop
Progress RV, in there - loads of RVs!
It is alright Trudy we're not trading you in! We will never trade Trudy in!
It is not going to happen !
We're just going to get you a little bit of tender loving care - a little patch up job!
so if you're wondering why we've come to an RV repair
you may remember a few months ago we had problem with the roof hatch
and that you could actually see daylight around here! Well it started to come loose again around here
and with all the bad weather and winter coming we just thought we should probably get it professionally looked at!
So we're going to go and see if they'll be able to reset it for us.
Let me see if someone is free, they are in the back moving things around - no worries, thank you!
I love gadgets, have you seen all this stuff, solar panels !!
Super helpful guys they've also given us a contact to try and repair our cracked windscreen,
so they've asked us to drive around to the workshop and have a look,
they did look a bit horrified when I said it's not screwed down it's just sealant
stuck down, so we'll see they'll give us an assessment on it!
Round there, there he is.
Okay, so it's this one right here? yeah - that one there.
And it is that front bit there,
okay so the guys are going to try and clamp this down for us and do a little bit of resealing,
but everybody here has been super super helpful and made us feel super welcome.
So we want to give a massive shout out to Progress RV here in Belle Fourche,
South Dakota baby!
They literally did the work, we went to pay, and the owner turned around and said it's on me!
Your travels are amazing - happy travels!
I cannot believe it - so the roof hatch is fixed what a great start to South Dakota
He was so kind, and said it was in gratitude for us putting the videos out we just love sharing
our adventures and we love that you guys want to come with us so for somebody to thank us like that,
it's just really sweet thank you!
Oh we had a fabulous night last night with our friends,
Susan and Scott - we went out for a great dinner in a local town near here
and we got to experience what it was like living on a ranch here in South Dakota!
This is Chris and Marianne, Do you call London Home - England...
Very nice horse! Wow, is he a youngster? Are you breaking or training?
Well he's not too terribly young but yeah we're training, we are going to start to teach him about throwing some steers on him,
somebody wants to play! ah!
What do you use these for? Are you supposed to sit on that?
No! I was going to say, it looks like you're going to sit on it,
somebody will pull it around, and then on a horse who is younger will learn to rope them.
Are you going to give us a demo? Yeah If you guys want to pull it around, I will rope it, oh really oh oh I'm so excited
we've got real stuff going on now!
real cowboy stuff!
So we're at Belle Fourche with the lovely Peterson Family who are just really welcoming us into their home,
and showing them what they get up to!
That's Jamie on that grey horse yeah so she roped that calf in the back, yep
and then she will pull him out, yeah.
And they're training horses, roping the cattle
[Music]
He makes that look easy, I can't even like finger knit with my fingers and
he's managed to hit a moving Target and lasso it - that is incredible!
Not a bad first day in South Dakota here that is for sure,
Marianne's going to be doing a bit of roping I think,
Okay, I'm not expected to get this right first time!
So you you actually swing it over your head? yeah okay, it comes around you.
just like extension of your arm basically,
oh yeah it gets wider and then you just let it go
and you do it sort of like that? Yeah okay, get a lot closer - go right up to it!
Get right up by it, keep going .... no way! she did it - first time ever!
Oh my goodness love,
yeah that's amazing,
I've not seen many people pick up a rope and do that first time! What the hell!!
So now Chris is going to show me how it should be done obviously!
Like that? that's it, you've got this! [Music]
he got its bum
I got its tail...
He got its bum!
so this morning we're heading to a local garage Scott Peterson Ford dealer,
which used to be owned
by Scott and Susan and they very kindly offered to have a look at Trudy,
and just check her little rattle to make sure everything is okay.
as we always say it's better to be safe than sorry,
and we rely on this vehicle so much to get us where we need to go, that we need to make sure she's fit and healthy!
so yeah, we're just going to go and get it checked out now!
They do forecast snow today and compared to yesterday the weather has turned
really really quickly, it was minus last night and it feels it,
hence the woolly hat
okay so it should be just down here on the left at the top of the hill Oh it's a cool old fire truck
it's a very nice town - Your destination is on the left.
And here we are, Scott Peterson Motors [Music]
Good morning!
it's snowing, it has just started snowing! it's actually snowing !
okay so we're leaving the keys with Brian the head mechanic he's going to
take Trudy for a little spin, listen to the Rattle and then it will all be good.
We've got our bag so we'll go and sit inside and work while she's being looked at.
Okay so the guys have just come in they said they've tightened a few things
they just want Marianne to take it for a little test run just to check,
that they've solved the rattle, but maybe it's a simple thing of tightening something up?
[Music]
Fortunately it was just a loose bolt or nut or something,
so they've tightened it up he also said to me Brian the guy who came out with me and he's been looking after Trudy,
He said to me, but I haven't quite finished because there's cable ties and bits hanging down,
yes she's held together with duct tape!
And I was like - oh actually that's me!
Because obviously on the Dempster highways you know if you're following us,
bits were falling off and and he was also laughing that we only have one mud flap left!
Absolutely amazing the guys at Scott Peterson Motors here they didn't charge us for the service!
Why is everyone in this town so damn lovely!
Okay so he has tightened the bolts, Trudy is all good, there's no major problems,
but the steering boot is a little bit dry and a bit decayed ... he said rotted ! Rotted so that's what's causing the rattle we think is the steering boot,
we'll have to wait until we get to Australia,
it's not going to cause any major damage for now,
so at least we know what it is, and the side door has dropped a little bit which creates a little bit of "wooo' Noise!
That's the dumpster highway! So when to Australia where they have Trudy Vans we're going to have to find someone,
who wants to work with us to really get everything sorted!
Okay so we've come down to Frontier Glass, and we'll give this a Bash
we don't have an appointment but we'll try our luck you never know we might get lucky
What I'm basically going to do is drill through the first layer glass,
and then after that I'll grab a different deal and put down there and it'll have a resin in it,
and that will force into the chip - oh amazing!
and then when it gets all done, I'll heat it up a little bit, but when it gets all done I use an ultraviolet light on it, and that stops IT getting worse? yep
And this is just a Polish there, yep,
Hey you've done this before? Just learning!
You're a very good student!
Is this your first time? first one I'm screwed up!
it's fixed it's now just a small Mark rather than a chip!
Amazing $47 later we are fixed! Thanks Roger! You can't see it - a fabulous job! a happy customer!