The four hour drive to the park was really exciting. For the first time since leaving the east coast, the side of the road actually looked different than what we were used to. The plains are incredible in their own right. They go on forever. A lot of people might find it boring, but we both found them to be very interesting. The hills got higher and higher, and buttes started appearing on the horizon. There was a lot of giggling. (Buttes are the mounds of earth)
Thinking that it was time for a late breakfast, we followed signs for the Schnell Recreation site, after getting off the highway at Richardton, ND the sign said it was another 10 miles but we decided to follow it - it was nice to be off the highway. It turns out that the Schnell Recreation site was a small area miles down a dirt road that had some history plaques, camp sites, and a picnic area. The view down the road, in between golden hills was spectacular.
Right next to the site there were some real live cowboys processing cattle. One of the plaques said that the large butte in front of us was called Young Man’s Butte. It was named that because of a battle between the Sioux and another tribe. The Sioux won in a route, and the only remaining warrior from the other tribe was a young man, and he declared that he would never be captured or killed by the Sioux and took his own life atop the Butte. The Sioux were impressed by his courage and decided to give him a good burial and named the butte after him. Hopefully, maybe, at the time they didn’t call butts butts cause if they did - someone we setting up North Dakota to be made fun of. After some yogurt and granola we headed back on the interstate.Theodore Roosevelt National Park Southern Unit (we didn’t go to the Northern unit) is in a canyon carved by the Missouri River and its tributaries. After being born and raised on “the island of Manhattan” (as the plaque said) Teddy first made it to ND when he was 24/25 (just like me!) on a Buffalo hunting trip. He decided to stay and became a rancher there. His original ranch is a few miles away from where we camped, and his ranch house was recreated at the park entrance. Our first view of the park came from the Painted Valley Visitor’s Center, we were blown away. The valley/canyon is incredibly expansive, with buttes, river beds, and flat plains areas. There we found out the park had Buffalo, Prairie Dogs, Elk, White-tailed Deer, Mule Deer, Mountain Goats (rams), and Feral Horses. In the park, we ended up seeing 6 out of 7 mammals, lots of birds, crickets, squirrels, and some spiders.
Driving into the park, we were on the lookout for Buffalo, they were definitely what we were most excited about, and were really worried we wouldn’t see any.
Boy were we wrong. In the visitor’s center, I read that they like to hang around prairie dog cities because the liked to roll around in the loose dirt to clean off. Pulling up to the first prairie dog city, even before we arrived at the campsite, we saw a bunch of Buffalo on a ridge about 100 yards away mostly covered by tall grass. I stop the car and Ashley craned out of the window trying to get the best angle. She took a lot of pictures and we waited for the best shot we can take there, the Buffalo’s head sorta turning towards us. Just about when we are about to leave, someone driving the other way suggests we go down the road, because a large male is on the side of the road. About a mile down the road, sure enough, a Buffalo was munching on grass right on the side of the road. We stopped to take pictures, eventually the Buffalo walked across the road about 20 yards in front of the car. They are really big, but didn’t seem to care about cars anywhere close. Especially Jack Danger because she’s tan (blends in with the plains) and very quiet.
We found the campsite, paid the $5 camping fee, set up camp, and took the 36 mile loop around the park. Over the 36 mile drive, we saw no less than 100 Buffalo, many of them right along the side of the road, a few white-tailed deer, about a dozen mule deer (they run by bounding like a rabbit or kangaroo), 10 feral horses, and a whole lot of prairie dogs.After the drive we decided to go check out the town right on the outskirts of the park. Medora ND, was part low class rancher town part Wild West Tourist town. The only totable thing actually was that for some reason they had free public wifi. It was awesome. We sat in the car for a while making plans for the next few days. It got dark and late, and we were an hour behind ND time so we headed back to the campsite, grateful that we had set everything up and could eat and go to bed!
When we left the visitor’s center earlier in the day, the park ranger said that he thought we might be sleeping with some buffalo tonight (because of where they were moving throughout the day). We had seen buffalo a few hundred yards from the campsite when we went on the tour, and we found our site to have a few-day-old pile of buffalo dung as well as some trampled grass. Pulling into out campsite, I was definitely afraid of seeing a buffalo sleeping between us and the tent. Although we were hyper-vigilant throughout our dinner by moon light and last bathroom trip, we didn’t hear any signs of buffalo. Waking up the next morning, we saw buffalo at the same place they had been the night before, about 300 yards from the camp. That was close enough for us.
We woke up, crawled out of the tent, and took a minute to look at the mountain ridge to our left. A mixture of evergreens, plains grasses, and exposed rock. I saw something at a peak, but couldn’t quite make it out, thought it must be a tree. When I looked back half an hour later it was gone. We heard some birds chirping at breakfast, but mostly it was just the sound of us chomping on granola and wind in the cottonwood trees.
We decided to go hiking on the Jones Creek Trail, a 1.8 mile down and back that took you into the center of the loop we drove around the day before. The park is split down the middle by the missouri river -- a much smaller but still formidable river. The entrance is to the east of the missouri, and there are no bridges over it. They say that people often ford the river, especially with horses, but at 18” deep neither of us had a desire to try. That limited us to the eastern half of the southern unit, but for a stay of just about 24 hours, that was plenty.
The trail follows a creek that was dried up except for some patches of mud or really shallow water. The badlands get rain infrequently, but when it comes, its torrential. I could see that creek as a 2 feet of rushing water after a rain fall or in the spring as the snow is melting.
The creek curves around the buttes, with relatively flat plains in the ‘valleys’ between them. As we went around each butte there was a little bit of a blind turn. Whomever happened to be in front when we got there noticeably slowed down and craned their neck towards the upcoming valley hoping that we weren’t sneaking on a buffalo, or a whole herd. The stampede from The Lion King is the visual that stayed in my mind.
We had to cross the creek twice, not a problem except for exceedingly steep banks. At the second crossing there was half of a buffalo carcass, probably about a year old. We could see the whole back half -- including skin. A tail, hoof, etc. Your not supposed to take any bones from the park, but I’m guessing thats where the front half went.
On the way back we decided to walk in the creek instead of the trail. Unlike a lot of other national parks I’ve been to, off trail hiking wasn’t regulated at all. Plains grasses are hearty enough to stand up to some human trampling. I’m sure the relatively low admissions to the park because its in North Dakota, helps them allow the whole park to be accessible.
There creek bed was covered in rocks of four distinct colors, and many various hues within each color. We could see the erosion caused by the stream that has caused it to, and continues to cause it to wind back and forth. We could see many bends that would soon (in geologic time) create oxbow lakes, or maybe just oxbow ditches.
We climbed out of the creek bed (about 10 feet below the trail) and met some people hiking in. They were from South Dakota and suggested some things for us to do while around Mt. Rushmore. They also suggested climbing to the top of a butte to see an amazing view. On our way back, I kept looking for a good butte to climb, and decided, inadvertently, on the tallest one. Ashley agreed to followed me up willingly, but I think she thought I was a little crazy. We saw an incredible 360 degree view with nothing above us for miles, and then followed an animal trail down.
We made it back to the car, and Ashley drove us to US-85 South. Going down 85, she had large chunks of time -- we are talking 30-45 minutes -- where she didn’t turn at all. NOT AT ALL! The road was completely straight. Cow and sheep pastures on either side. Some horses and one buffalo pasture also. We passed through some towns with populations of 308, 625, etc. Not a lot there. The upper plains are incredible though, the landscape is magnificent. Its so nice to see grass land, instead of cornfields or suburban developments.
Somewhere on the drive we drove through butte county, and saw Bear Butte.
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