Rivers West Tour - Day 17

Today was another travel day.  We were supposed to travel the Enchanted Highway, which has seven large metal sculptures beside the road, and then proceed to Medora, North Dakota.  Unfortunately, we didn't make it to Medora.

First, a few pictures of the sculptures along the Enchanted Highway.  It was rainy and windy the entire way so we didn't stop and pictures were taken through the RV's windshield.

As I mentioned above, it was rainy and very windy--70 mph winds windy.  After we'd seen two of the sculptures, we heard a loud bang and a bumping noise.  David pulled over as quickly as possible and went around the rig to see this.

Notice the metal pieces sticking out from the side of the RV.  Those are the extension poles for our awning.  The awning broke loose and whipped across the top of the RV, breaking the moon roof in the shower, the vent in the bathroom and the sewer vent.  In addition, it tore a hole in the front driver's corner and "unzipped" the roof from its channel on that side of the rig.  (I neglected to get pictures from the other side.)

The young man on top of the roof was driving a truck going the other way.  He immediately stopped and was on the roof before we could get out of the RV.  David threw him a pocket knife and he was able to cut away the awning's fabric.  They also tie wrapped the poles that were sticking out and after leaving a twenty foot piece of awning on the side of the road, we were on our way.  What was left of the awning however, kept banging into the side of the motorhome and sounded like a rifle shot each time.

Instead of going on to Medora, we stopped at the next town of any size which was Dickinson, North Dakota.  Unfortunately, none of the RV dealers worked on or even sold motorhomes.  At this point, we were afraid our trip was over and were contemplating having to rent a U-Haul and heading home.  

We parked in a Walmart parking lot while trying to get help.  We had called both Good Sam and AAA and Good Sam gave us some phone numbers to call.  The first one we tried never called us back, but the second one answered his phone and we ended up meeting him at his shop about 9:30 that night.

We pulled the RV inside his building and after inspecting the damage, he decided that he could fix it the next day.  The company is Alternative Towing and they specialize in pulling big rigs out of ditches, not working on motorhomes.

We left the RV with him and went to find a hotel to spend the night.  Because of the wind, most of the hotels were full for the night, but after several tries, the Comfort Inn was able to accommodate us. It did take 45 minutes to get us checked in, because they were having computer issues, but their persistence paid off for us.

Because of our detour, we missed the Pitchfork Fondue Dinner and the Medora Musical.  I'm told that although the food was good, it was too rainy and windy to enjoy it and the musical was cancelled.

Tomorrow, we're back on the road to Medora.