Badlands National Park

6/26-- 6/29, 2025

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Badlands National Park is a vast wilderness of jagged buttes, spires and pinnacles, the largest undisturbed mixed-grass prairie in the United States, and the world’s richest trove of fossils from the Oligocene epoch, estimated at 23 to 35 million years old.   Badlands National Park offers some of the most striking otherworldly landscapes found in South Dakota with its stark rock formations and rolling prairies.  Badlands was established a national monument in 1939, and was redesignated a national park in 1978.  The movie Dances with Wolves (1990) was partially filmed in Badlands National Park.

Getting there ...

We continued our Dakota trip after visiting Mount Rushmore, Custer State Park, Wind Cave and Jewel Cave,  and arrived in Badlands National Park and checked in to the Cedar Pass Lodge (the only lodge inside the national park) at about 3PM.

Day 7 (6/26) ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Day 8 (6/27) ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

Fossil Exhibit 

 

White River Valley Overlook 

 

Big Foot Pass Overlook  Panorama Point  

 

   
Burns Basin Overlook    

 

Homestead Overlook Yellow Mounds 

Pinnacles Overlook 

It was getting hot in the mid-day today (~97F, but feel like more than 110F).  We returned to our cabin in Cedar Pass to have a cool relaxed afternoon in our room.

Panorama Point 

White River Valley 

 

 

Day 9 (6/28) ...

 

 

 

 

 

We went to the nearby small town of Interior to have a quick lunch.  Since there were many motorcyclists in the restaurant we planned to go, we decided to move to a different place (a food truck called Katie's Kantina) to have some delicious Mexican food.  After lunch, it's time to go back our room to cool down a little for the afternoon.

 

 

   

Day 10 (6/29) ...

White River Valley  Panorama Point 

 
Burns Basin 

Conata Basin 

Yellow Mounds 

 

 

 

 

 

When we were back from the Sheep Mountain Table Road, we saw another big herd of bison on the grassland across SD Hwy 27.  It seems a big bison day for us :-)

 

Going Home ...

We concluded our 10-day Dakota road trip after returned to Rapid City Airport at about 3:30PM.  It's amazing to see the "raw" American Midwest:  from the rolling prairies to the barren badlands, from the dramatic Black Hills needles and spires to the fantastic but yet mysterious underground caves, from the vast wilderness to abundant wildlife, from the cultural heritage of native Dakota tribes to the iconic Mount Rushmore American spirits, this was a trip of different American experiences.

 


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