June 10 - Badlands National Park

June 10

We explored the Badlands National Park today with an introduction at the Visitor Center. They had an excellent film, some are better than others, and museum. 38 million years ago, animals with such names as Archaeotherium and Titanothere roamed this land before erosion had taken place. 75 million years ago the land was covered by a large sea and with ancient fish swimming about. Scientists have been using this area as an outdoor laboratory for over 150 years. It is rich with fossil remains. Paleontologists are studying fossilized animal, plant life, tracks and even pollen right here. Two years ago a seven year old girl tripped over the semi buried skull of a saber tooth type animal during a Junior Ranger Program. She notified the ranger and now an entire area next the to Visitor Center is about to be carefully excavated. With visitors welcome in the lab, we watched as a young college student very carefully picked away the dirt around a large jaw bone. You are allowed to walk anywhere in the park but you must leave any fossils you may find and let them know the location!

Area to be excavated near the Visitor center
after a7 year old girls found a saber tooth skull.

We drove the loop road stopping at each overlook and reading our park road guide along the way. What a gorgeous day. It was windy, it’s always windy here, but blue, blue sky and big puffy white clouds. The loop road took us up through “The Wall” of buttes, pinnacles and spires. The colors of sand, rose and gold are much subdued compared to places like Zion, Bryce and the Grand Canyon but oh so lovely. What a stunning panorama. Much of the grasslands are bright spring green with fields and fields of beautiful yellow sweet clover. The clover is not native but it certainly beautiful. The early pioneer families planted the seeds to beautify the grasslands. Of course the National Park is not happy about the many invasive plants here today but we enjoyed the grassland views and wild flowers. Only 2% of the grassland remains on our continent. About half way along the loop, the road turns to gravel. It is in this section where we saw groups of bison, a pronghorn, and mountain sheep. Lucky Us! We saw hundreds of prairie dogs sitting up checking us out and scampering around. A mother and her two babies gave us quite a show. Looking out to the gorgeous buttes and pinnacles, it is amazing to think that they are losing about an inch a year to erosion. The landscape is ever changing. We took a few short walks and were able to get in among the formations to enjoy the beauty up close and personal.

A Small Section of "The Wall"
Breath Taking Formations on the Loop Road

Area where Chief Big Foot led his people as they traveled to Wounded Knee.

What color!

We were lucky to see many groups of bison grazing on the grassland.

Prairie Dog Putting on a Show

Mountain Sheep

We timed our day so we would end up in the South Unit of the park on the Lakota Reservation in the late afternoon. The exhibits are well done at the Visitor Center giving us a history of the native people living here before and after their land was changed forever by the early frontier men and pioneer families seeking new land. Earlier we had looked across the land where Chief Big Foot was in route to Wounded Knee with 350 of his people. They were trying to get to the safety of the Oglala’s home. It was there in mid winter where the Seventh Cavalry caught up with them killing over 200 Oglala from the Great Sioux Nation. This massacre is considered to be the last major armed conflict. The Visitor Center explained how their life as they had known it was gone forever with the slaughtering of the bison. They had depended on the bison for literally everything from tools, food, clothing, toys, cooking equipment, tepees and bedding. Everything! On top of that these nomadic people were confined to an area of 160 acres each of poor farming and grazing land.

Chris, Norm and Mom had a phenomenal experience here in 1993. They knew it could not be repeated but we wanted to try our best. Mom had read about the amazing view at Sheep Mountain Table in the Badlands. They set off for a day trip from Custer to see what they could see. They were in their small pickup truck with the three of them in the front seat on a dirt “path” and nearly tipped over just trying to get there. Christy remembers hanging on for dear life yelling “We’re going to die!” The drive was worth every minute and the memories will be in a held in a very special category. The colors and formations are the prettiest in the park. I’m saying this on here say since today we didn’t make it. They have graveled the first two miles to the first overlook but the treasured sight is another three miles and more of a path than a road. High clearance is needed to make it. We tried but ruining the car for a view just didn’t seem worth it. Darn! We will find out if we still have trailer lights tomorrow when we move on the Custer State Park. What a gorgeous day! We stopped for dinner at the only place around for buffalo burgers and buffalo chili and then went back up to loop road to try to get cell service. We made a call to Allison for her birthday but they were at the movies. We left her our version of the “birthday song” on their message machine.