Surviving Sturgis

Hi all,
 We are now into prime Sturgis week, bikes are everywhere and the sounds continue all day with no break.It quiets down in the later evening and even with many bikers in camp by 10 pm the campground is dead quiet.
 We watched the Sturgis mayor's ride come into the park. They were having lunch at the Game Lodge pavilion. The governor was also in attendance. Lukas counted 179 bikes and a few more came after that.

  On Tuesday we took a chance it wouldn't be to crazy out and went to Hill City to ride the 1880's steam train. It travels to Keystone and back. You can spend time in Keystone though we chose an immediate return. It was a nice ride and we saw deer, turkey and some marmots.

 After that we just strolled down main street admiring the bikes. Wendy said she felt like we needed to be wearing black tee shirts to be here. People watching is also a good past time while here, though I hear this is nothing compared to being in Sturgis. Well this is as close as we are getting.

 We talked to a ranger the other day and he said they were averaging four bike accidents an hour in the hills. There was also one fatality on Needles Hwy. Many people going to fast on these curvy roads.
 So we are down to the last week of work here. We will be sad to leave what has turned out to be a great adventure for us.

 We also had a change to our plans as a trip to the rv factory in Smith Center is now needed. Seems we have the black tank blues. In the process of dumping, a large pop occurred. Water and nasty was flowing from the tank and under. Near as I can tell the tank separated from the pipe. After checking around seems the best option is to just head to Kansas for the correct repair. The under belly needs to be removed for a sure evaluation and insulation replaced. Thus is the life of a full time rv'er. Taking the bad with the good.