The Badlands

Made our way from Rapid City, South Dakota into the Badlands but before we hit the park we stopped for a donut and a missile exhibit.

https://www.nps.gov/mimi/what-is-so-special-about-this-place.htm

Had the virtual tour of the last remaining of S Dakota’s 15 missile control bunkers. The real tour was booked out months ago. The presenter was a retired missileer who worked there through the Cold war.

After learning how NOT to destroy the world we proceeded into Badlands National Park.

We went though the visitors centre, procrastinating as much as possible to avoid being outside in the heat before setting off for a walk taking advantage of the shade provided by the afternoon sun.

The kids were probably most interested in the small striped squirrels (which I don’t have a photo of on my phone). We decided much to their dissatisfaction that we would sign up for the Junior Naturalist program the next morning at 8am to hopefully avoid the heat. The only problem was that we didn’t have a place for the night and drove 45 minutes and out of the park to find some dispersed camping on BLM land (Buero of Land Management). We had lots of neighbors all parked along the rim, it was a cool spot even if we had to get up early to drive back to the visitors centre. I’m glad we did though as even at 8am it was sweltering, the rangers did a good program and the kids even found some new fossils that weren’t planted!

We are now in Bismarck North Dakota after boosting up from Badlands and will head to Grand Forks today to meet my cousin who is coming down from Winnipeg.