Not Just Another Day Driving

We left Clearwater at 6am with cool temperatures. Unfortunately the cooler weather brought with it WIND, heavy head-winds. But after 9 hours and 500 miles we arrived in Medora, ND and Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Since we picked up another hour going into Mountain time zone we had time for a quick park visit. What is this place? The Park is comprised of the North Dakota Badlands or Painted Canyons. And yes Custer was here too.

 

 

We grabbed our cameras and set forth. The first spot we came to was the first Prairie Dog Village complete with a visiting buffalo. He gave us a great show by lying down and rolling on his back to dust himself. I did not get photos of him rolling.

 

A couple miles down the road in the Little Missouri River Valley we saw an antelope out in the field. A couple of miles further we saw our first two wild horses. They were very close to the road and being very playful. A few miles further there were three separate herds of wild horses, along with several young colts. There were lots of different formations from the eroded landscape, with numerous different layers evident.

 

As for Medora, it was founded by a Frenchman (1884) building a cattle slaughterhouse to ship fresh meat in Northern Pacific refrigerator cars. The meat plant is gone but the town survives on the tourist dollar.

 

All in all Katherine was very happy since she saw the buffalo, numerous prairie dogs, the antelope, and many wild horses. Not a bad day for “just another travel day.”