Our Last National Park Visit

On the return trip, I planned to take the northern route on Route 90 to Route 94 through North Dakota instead of staying on I-90 through South Dakota. The goal here was to revisit Theodore Roosevelt National Park's South Unit near the quaint western town of Medora, ND. Similar to South Dakota, the western end of the state has interesting badlands and the park is a great quick visit. (If truth be told, another objective here was to revisit a tiny bakery in town that had the best strawberry and blueberry cream cheese croissants under the sun.)

After getting a later start than I had hoped for, we arrived in Medora at about 7pm. We checked into our room at the Badlands Motel and grabbed some decent pizza at the local pizza parlor. The food was good because we were hungry but nothing to write home about (blog notwithstanding). Then, we took a drive into the park to see wildlife and views as the sun would soon be setting over the badlands. These drives at dusk are nearly always enjoyable, especially when there are few people, wonderful views, and you can really take your time.

Some of the unique denizens of this park are the feral horses. Approximately 100-140 horses roam freely in and out of the park. Colin took the nice photo below.

Wild Horses in Teddy Roosevelt NP

This park is also known for its prairie dogs. They really are, for lack of a better word, cute. They scurry around their towns with seemingly boundless energy. They come in all sizes and shapes (many are quite tubby!).

We tried to get some good sunset photos but it wasn't in the cards tonight. Upon returning to town, we found some desert at a local grocery store and stumbled upon these humorous Pepsi and Coke machines. Everything is done a bit differently in the west including the vending machines...

Pepsi vs. Coke, Western Style