The Badlands

We really felt as though we had arrived in the West as we entered Badlands National Park, South Dakota. Immense rock structures stretch across the landscape, surrounded by endless grass prairie. The structures are a result of both deposits (the area was at some point covered in prehistoric forests, inland seas) and erosion, as about 500,000 years ago the Cheyenne and other rivers started to wash away the softer material leaving the park as we see it today. Whilst harsh, they are beautiful, with subtle and constantly changing colours as the light moves during the day.

We saw quite a lot of wildlife – Deer, Bighorn Mountain Sheep, Prairie Dog, Pronghorn and some glimpses of Bison in the distance. The Prairie Dog towns were a lot of fun, the girls thought they were adorable (“can you have Prairie Dogs as pets”).

Our cabin felt pretty remote out on the prairie – we were one mile from the homestead, which itself was about 9 miles from the nearest town: Interior – population 67. It’s pretty dark out there when the sun goes down!

The Prairie

Badlands

Bighorn Sheep

Praire Dogs

Endless views

We had great fun at 1880 Town, a museum that has gathered a bunch of buildings from the era between 1880 to 1920 and filled them with authentic period pieces. Best of all was dressing up in gear from the era and hanging out in the town, including an old saloon. The girls’ imaginations went wild – very quickly they were a team of cowgirl vigilantes of sorts taking on a slew of bad guys with their guns (and girl-power attitude).

No visit to the region (or at least driving on I-90 here) is complete without visiting the only remaining Corn Palace (yes – you did not misread this, a building part made out of corn), and of course Wall Drug. After seeing scores of roadsigns, we had to visit this institution from the 1930’s that made its name and fortune by giving out free iced waters to parched travellers traversing the state.

Ana’s propensity to convert nouns to verbs generated a new addition to the trip vocabulary – “Hey Amelie – let’s double-adapt“. Meaning: let’s watch the same program at the same time.