Theodore Roosevelt National Park - South Unit - North Dakota

July 21 

On the drive to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, we passed by all the same prairie that is the norm here, when all of a sudden the landscape changed to the Badlands. WOW! We also noticed quite a few oil wells and beehives amongst the prairie. 

From their website is an explanation of the various colors that make up these beautiful North Dakota Badlands:

"The sedimentary layers exposed in the Little Missouri Badlands are mainly continental sediments that were deposited by rivers and streams flowing east to the Dakotas from the Rocky Mountains in Montana and Wyoming at the time of the Laramide orogeny. They consist of layers of poorly lithified siltstone, claystone, sandstone, and lignite coal that were deposited in a coastal plain environment. River, floodplain, and swamp deposits predominate. Bluish gray layers of weathered volcanic ash form excellent marker beds in places and brownish gray layers of sand containing thin, orange, iron-rich bands also form prominent markers. Black veins of lignite coal are common and reddish bands of clinker (materials that were baked when buried lignite veins burned) add color to the area."

We started our day by stopping at the Painted Canyon. We had a lovely sunny day for viewing the layers of color in the sandstone. However, it was extremely WINDY! We hiked part of the trail that goes down into the valley and saw quite a few birds along the way. The views were incredible. The photos do not begin to show the beauty that is seen in person.

 Brown Thrasher

 Spotted Towhee

 Spotted Towhee

Spotted Towhee

 Mountain Bluebird

 Chipping Sparrow

 Rock Wren - mother feeding baby 

 Rock Wren

From there we went to the South Unit Visitor’s Center and drove the 36 mile scenic drive through the North Dakota Badlands. There are pullouts where you can stop and view the scenery or hike the trails. There is not any food or drink in the park, so we packed a picnic lunch. We walked a few of the different trails an climbed to the top of a few viewpoints.

Along the way are numerous Prairie Dog Towns. OMG, are these guys cute. Some are on watch duty, others are out eating and others are playing and jumping and tumbling with each other. 

 one ran and pounced on the other one

 he landed on top

 they ran off together

 Prairie Dog Town

 Eastern Bluebird

 Eastern Bluebird

 Prairie Dog Town

 Mountain Bluebird

 wild horses

We stopped to walk the Old East Entrance trail. The trail to the park’s original entrance station goes through a prairie dog town. A pregnant Prairie Dog was gathering as much of the grass as she could in her mouth & took it down into the den. She appeared to be pregnant and was making her nest. The cute factor was off the charts. She would gather a bunch in her mouth and then stop and look up at us like “what?” and then she'd go back to cramming more in there, look up, repeat. Then, she took her over-stuffed mouthful to her den.

 prickly pear cactus along the way

 Prairie Dog Town

 this is the pregnant one gathering nesting material

full enough, she took it down into the den

We saw several large herds of Bison and many lone males. We also saw quite a few wild horses (feral). 

 We climbed the short but steep trail to Buck Hill

 large herd of bison from the top of the hill

 his family took over the highest spot and never left the entire time we were up there

 the parking lot below - Greg on the right

 we climbed up the hill across the street to get a better view of the bison

 Buck Hill from the viewpoint across the street

 lone male back on the scenic drive

 small herd just past the lone male

 another lone male along the way

 wild horse high on the hill

 zoomed in photo of the horse on the hill

 another lone male

 We hiked the Wind Canyon Trail which was a bit of a steep, but short hike along the cliff edge above the Little Missouri River. 

 Little Missouri River

 Cooper's Hawk

 another Prairie Dog Town

 We saw a coyote running through a prairie dog town (probably looking for a snack).

 coyote

 another lone male

where's the rest of the buffalo

 small herd of bison on top of the hill

 Say's Phoebe

We saw around 10 grouse fly out of some tall grass; still no photos, but it was a great sight.

We went around the loop twice looking for more animals. The first time we drove the whole way around stopped to eat our picnic lunch and then did the loop again getting out and doing the viewpoints and trails.

We had gotten tickets to the Medora Musical with dinner at Pitchfork Steak Fondue. 

Just as the name states it’s steaks put on a pitchfork and cooked in large pots of peanut oil. There is also a buffet of sides including, garlic toast, beans, coleslaw, baked potatoes and for dessert donuts and brownies. All this with a spectacular view of the Badlands and a band playing while you eat. It’s not the best food in the world, but a fun experience and worth going. They feed around 500 people in a short amount of time so all things considered it was handled very efficiently.

The weather however was taking a turn. There was only a 10% chance of rain, but it was getting dark and storms were all around. They delayed the show for around 10 minutes when a guy came out and said they wanted to wait 45 minutes to an hour for the storms to pass and it was best if we waited in our cars and they would send someone to the parking lot to update us. So, wait we did. 

Then, we got the news that they were letting us enter the outdoor arena. As we walked in it started to rain again. The radar indicated that it should pass, so they let us go in handing us paper towels to wipe our seats with. It was still windy and a bit cold. Once we were seated we saw a very pathetic rainbow. (I think it knew just how futile the evening was) at about 9:00 (show was to start at 7:30) someone came out and announced they were canceling the show. They offered 3 options. Full refund, exchange for a different night and for locals they could turn in their tickets and get twice as many back. It was a slow process with probably over 500 people and only 4 cashiers but eventually we got to the front and traded for Monday night (with much better seats). It was after 11:00 when we got home. It was a long but fantastic day (if you forget the rain out of the show.)

https://photos.app.goo.gl/FdP8QJxjBKuKqUuB9

Tomorrow we have an early start and plan to visit the North Unit of the park.