I started my day today in Badlands National Park and ended it at my third stop of the trip: Hill City, South Dakota. There are a handful of trails in the Badlands and I tackled a few of them today, stopped at some scenic overlooks, and relaxed in Hill City.
Door Trail The Door trail, Window trail, and Notch trail all start conveniently from the same parking lot a little south of the Northeast entrance to the park. The Door trail has a short boardwalk to a “door” overlooking some of the badlands. My favorite part of the trail actually came after the boardwalk ended. There is a half-mile “trail” starting at the end of the boardwalk that takes you to a viewpoint where you are surrounded by badlands in all directions. I use the term “trail” loosely, as the trail isn’t really a marked trail. There are numbered yellow posts to keep you going in the right direction, but you can get from post to post however you want. I kept thinking, “this is so cool!” as I wandered over and around the rock formations.
Window Trail The window trail is only 1/5 mile long and leads to a “window” overlooking the badlands. It’s a boardwalk the whole way and leads to a pretty view at the end.
Notch Trail The Notch trail ends at a notch in the rocks and overlooks the prairies surrounding the badlands. The trail is pretty flat at first, and then… bam! A log ladder to scale in order to continue on. The ladder leads to a narrow ridge which eventually opens up to continue to the notch.
Overlooks I stopped at several of the pull offs and overlooks along the Badlands Loop Road to take in the views. The colors of the rocks with their layers is just incredible, though the harsh sunlight made it hard to capture all the colors well.
Sage Creek Rim Road Sage Creek Road connects Badlands National Park to Route 44 just outside of Scenic, South Dakota. The road is 25 miles long, partially paved and partially gravel. The road passes Roberts Prairie Dog Town and several viewpoints en route to Scenic. Scenic itself is a semi-ghost town with a handful of residents and a series of abandoned buildings.
Food I ate a lot of junk food today. For breakfast, I indulged in two donuts that I picked up at Wall Drug yesterday. I ate one (chocolate frosted) at the Big Badlands Overlook and one (vanilla frosted) at Bigfoot Pass overlook. They were good, but unmemorable. Then I finished off a bag of ranch dip Combos from yesterday. I stopped at Prairie Berry Winery and sampled five of their wines when I got to Hill City. I’m not a big wine drinker (cider, please!) but they were all pretty good. Then for dinner I ended up at Bumpin’ Buffalo Bar and Grill for a pulled pork quesadilla and a huckleberry lemonade drink. Dessert was a scoop of Madagascar Vanilla ice cream.
I decided to take the night off and relax, which involved YouTube videos and a little reading. Tomorrow, I’m off to see the presidents! (Can you guess where?)
Traveling with Laura 