THEODORE ROOSEVELT NATIONAL PARK, NORTH UNIT
About 60 million years ago, streams carried eroded materials eastward from the young Rocky Mountains and deposited them on a vast lowland—today’s Great Plains. During the warm, rainy periods that followed, dense vegetation grew, fell into swampy areas, and was later buried by new layers of sediments. Eventually this plant material turned into lignite coal. Some plantlife became petrified. Today considerable amounts of petrified wood are exposed in the badlands. Bentonite, the blue-gray layer of clay, may be traced to ash form ancient volcanoes far to the west. But even as sediments were being deposited, streams were starting to cut down through the soft strata and to sculpt the infinite variety of buttes, tablelands, and valleys that make up the badlands we know today.
We drove the 14 mile road through the park stopping at many points along the way. We took a nature trail for .8 miles which pointed out and explained many of the different features of the badlands. We saw a herd of buffalo move into the river below an overlook. We also saw 2 mule deer, 1 white tail deer, and one wild turkey.
We took 5 hours to drive through the North Unit and we saw some spectacular sites.
SOUTH UNIT
On Friday we moved our camp to the southern unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We got a nice site and then took a tour of this end of the park. The loop road was 36 miles long and we saw many of the same things as we did in the north unit.
This unit is much more popular than the north. In the north unit there were probably not more than 10 cars as we passed through. The south unit, however, was very busy. As we entered the park to go to our campground we had to stop for a herd of buffalo to cross the street. They stopped right in the middle of the road and we had to sit. Needless to say, I got great pictures!
During our tour we saw several wild horses, and many, many prairie dogs that you could hear “barking”.
When we went to bed at night we saw the buffalo passing about 25 feet from the camper. They came right into the campground and passed through it to get water. I couldn’t get any pictures because Steve wouldn’t let me get out of the camper…
All in all Theodore Roosevelt National Park was the most interesting place to visit to experience the badlands and all their creatures.
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