Pullin' Chocks

Friday, June 6, 2014

Tool Chest Project

We relocated the Weatherguard tool chest from the back of Pepe our truck onto a cargo tray installed into the rear Class III receiver at the back of Penelope our 5th wheel coach. We added a 6" Blue Ox receiver riser to get the tray up for rear ground clearance. We installed the tray in Kansas and rode up to South Dakota without an incident. Since we have been here in Rapid City, we moved the tool chest. We haven't had the full combo out on the road yet but that time is quickly approaching.

We will install a 45 gallon auxiliary diesel fuel tank in the back of Pepe where the tool chest had been. We expect to take delivery of the tank the week before we depart Rapid City. I don't expect that we will accomplish the full install before we leave SD. We expect to have lots of time back in Junction City so should finish that upgrade there.

Overview picture of the finished tool chest relocation project. It must have been cold that day, Gari has her Arctic coat on!

We relocated the license plate to the tray from the back of the trailer. We may need to install a license plate light there... Normally we don't drive our rig in the dark so this shouldn't be an issue anytime soon.

Side view, see the rise.

Top View, see the clamps and locks. The top clamp we were able to use an aftermarket clamp with 16 set bolts. We bought two of these clamps at $20 each. Unfortunately we were unable to use the second clamp due to clearance issues, so we found a 3-1/2" beam clamp at Tractor supply for $5 and used that for the bottom clamp. Looks fine sitting on the lot, we will see how it performs down the road. We picked up two Reese receiver locks, one is extra long so it also fits Pepe's larger 4" receiver opening. That is the big one in the top hole.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Jewel Cave National Monument, Custer, South Dakota

We finally took a trip to a local cave. I have been wanting to do this since we got here. I had been to the Mammoth Caves in Eastern Kentucky before and really enjoyed that experience so wanted to repeat the fun. There are a bunch of caves in the Black Hills area so we weren't sure which one to visit. There are too many to visit all of them and many charge a substantial admission price. And many of those are really not worth the price of admission so we wanted to choose wisely. We took Bruce and Brenda's advice from their previous visit and went with Jewel Cave. It was an outstanding recommendation. I must say it was every bit as good as the Mammoth Cave experience if not better and that is saying something.

Two brothers discovered the only natural opening to the cave around 1900 while horseback riding. Then President Teddy Roosevelt declared Jewel Cave a National Monument about 8 years later after the brothers determined it was not a gold mine. The visitors center and moderns paths and walk ways were constructed over 6 years in the late 1960's and early 1970's

Jewel Cave National Monument Visitor's Center

Notice the small box on the ground under the pavilion roof in the above photo. More about that later..

Gari at the trail heads outside the Visitor's Center.

Jewel Cave

Our Park Ranger Guide Melissa providing the history, geology and rules of the cave. The steel doors behind her protect the elevator shaft and two elevators that are the second of only three known openings to the cave system. The day we were there Melissa announced that two new large rooms were just discovered the previous day. This increased the known distance of cave to ~170 miles. That's a lot of cave!

Down we went on aluminum stairs.

The first platform is about 250 feet below the surface. Pictures don't really capture the full effect you get when you are in there, but it gives an idea of what's down there.

Walkways past the abundant calcite crystals in the cave. The tour was 90 minutes so I estimate that we walked around 1 mile underground which included over 700 steps, some up some down.

Cautious concern at 450 feet below the surface...

Small stalagtites

Cave Bacon, see the strip?

"The Box"

At the entrance to the Visitor's Center is a concrete box that represents a typical opening from one part of the cave system to another. The box acts as a test jig simulating an opening one must crawl through in order to explore the cave. Apparently this opening is not one of the smallest...

Of course I had to try this... One arm up and one arm back was the advice given by the Ranger that had explored remote areas of the cave.

OK this is frightening, my chest was compressed as I piulled myself through. I can't imagine how horrible it would be to try this in a cave where the passage is longer than two feet! Not for me I assure you!

Phew! I think I've got it made now!

The End!

Friday, May 23, 2014

Beautiful Black Hills, South Dakota

Gari & I have started to scratch the surface of the places to go and things to see in the Black Hills area. We started with the Mt. Rushmore National Monument and continued with the various lakes and wildlife areas in Custer State Park and the Black Hills National Forest areas. The rolling and rugged rocky landscape is quite a profound change from what we are accustomed with back on the Eastern Shore of Virginia and Maryland. We find the scenery to be beautiful. The pictures don't seem to capture the complete majesty of the actual landscape, and after a while of looking at all the beauty our senses seem to go numb... see what you think.