Touring the Badlands

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July 15-16



On day two in the Badlands, laundry almost done, we left the dog’s and drove to the Badlands park visitors center. We enjoyed the archeological bones exhibit. We picked up our magnet. We have 60+ now on the refrigerator from all our trips. Just seven so far this trip.



We headed out toward the loop road which explores the western half of the park. There were some beautiful vistas with lush green grass separating the sedimentary formations. The farther north the color of the formations changed and began exhibiting streaks of yellow and reddish hues among the common grey formations. It certainly beautiful in its foreboding desolation. We wondered how did Indians and pioneers survive this area? We saw remnants of sod huts from those days.



This area was once inhabited by a large number of bison but very few survived. We did see a few roaming buffalo today, off in the distance. The national grasslands park is adjacent to the Badlands park and the buffalo roam there too. We saw several groups of Mountain goats. It reminded me of Yellowstone Park when I was a kid. You knew there were animals by the traffic jam of cars on the road. Everyone was out of the car taking pictures. It was hot outside today too but when we got out for pictures we never encountered mosquitos. Maybe there just all down by us and the river I thought!



We returned via a dirt road to highway 44, there we encounter a herd of angus cattle taking up their nap in the middle of the road. It was slow going waiting for each cow to get up and move her calf off the road. Finally we hit highway 44 and then back east to our campground.



Back at the campground David suggested we try the restaurant at the campground. Sounded good to me so we wandered over, swatting ourselves much of the walk. Once at the “restaurant” we noted it was patio seating with a screened window to give the cook your order. Pretty much burgers, chips and that was about all they offered. We sat on the patio waiting to get our food and take it back to the trailer. A young couple was there too. She was wearing shorts and her legs looked like she had the measles. Her legs were covered in red dots. She said she’d nearly been carried off by the mosquitoes. We got our food and practically ran, for two old people it was running, back to the trailer. We laughed as we ate our sparse dinner and talked about the “restaurant”.



The final day was finishing cloths, cleaning, spraying Bactine on bites, and looking forward to leaving this place. Why they don’t spray to kill mosquitos is beyond our comprehension but we would not recommend this park. It nice but who cares, you’ll be eaten alive!!

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