Aug 03, 2014

Thumbnail is a shot of the log cabin Theodore Roosevelt lived in when he came back to the North Dakota Badlands to mourn the loss of his wife and daughter in childbirth and of his mother from Typhoid in the same house on the same day in New York. He ultimately became a rancher in this rugged area he loved and credits his time here with his desire to develop a conservation consciousness within the population of the USA and was ultimately responsible for establishing the National Forest Service and ensuring one tenth of the country being made National Parks Forest and Grassland. Quite a legacy.

 

We woke to hear a second storey shower fairly drumming.......hang on the motel is single story and that water was fairly thundering down. DOH. So much for clear skies for the next few days. Not to worry, it was still raining when we went for breakfast and headed for the National Park Visitor Centre. This is a street shot in Medora across the street from where we had breakfast. The whole town is built in the old west style.

 

Just before we got into the National Park area yesterday we had travelled through National Plains Grassland right up until the base of the country we are in now known as the North Dakota Badlands. An interesting geology story exists for why they are as they are but I won't go into that here. This is a colourful cliff face of multi-colour clay. The area is changing with every rain shower and snow thaw as the fine clays wash down the hillsides as we saw in many spots on the roadside today.

 

An example of the clay washing away and stronger layers of sandstone remaining forming verandas over the receding clay.

 

This process eventually leaves precarious structures referred to as Hoodoos and this is a distant shot of one, sorry it is a bit fuzzy.

 

And an example of concretions..

 

And the great sights just kept changing and developing. Too many photo opportunities will never be enough!

 

And a shot out over the Badlands from a scenic look over.

 

And climbing up the Wind Canyon.

 

And some resident Bison. I was happy to see the one near the road lie down as it had been digging up dirt with one of its front legs before that and I wasn't confident I could do a U turn before he got to me.

 

And some wild horses. Both were feeding on the native grass and the wildflower with a fine golden yellow flower with a fragrance reminiscent of wattle. There was also sagebrush present (grey green bush) and combined the soft fragrances were sublime on the damp morning air.

 

Back to Medora for lunch and here is the Billings County Courthouse again styled in the western style.

 

And finally we headed for the Painted Canyon lookout and realised we had already seen some great examples of the red painted look but this was with good perspective. The colour comes from coal seams catching fire after a lightening strike and the heat baking the clay above it. This makes for some interesting shapes as the buttes disintergrate and we should see some good examples of that tomorrow when we check out the North Unit of the Park as we head off for our next destination.