Badlands National Park is one of the 2 national parks located in South Dakota. It may not be as famous as other national parks such as Yellowstone or Grand Teton, the unique landscape at Badlands National Park has attracted many tourists. Badlands National Park is just about an hour East of Rapid City, thus people can simply visit Badlands National Park while they visit Mount Rushmore.
The scenic route to visit Badlands National Park is to drive through Route 240. There are 2 entrances. People can drive from East to West, or from West to East. We wanted to visit Badlands National Park during sunrise, thus we went to the East entrance first to see the sunrise.
We got to Big Badlands Overlook first around 5:30AM in the morning. It was just few minutes before the sunrise and there were only 4 other people there. Due to the severe thunderstorm from previous night, the ground was very muddy. We had to stay on the board walk. The sunrise at Big Badlands Overlook was simply amazing. The soft sun light shone among the rugged landscape was extraordinary. We have never seen such beautiful scenery before.
Our next stop was to drive South along Route 240 and get to Notch Trail. This area had a very large parking lot. Other than Notch Trail, there was also Door Trail and Window Trail. These trails allow people to step onto the rugged surface and have a closer look to the land formation.
As we drove down Route 240, we were really amazed by the landscape at Badlands National Park. The road at Badlands National Park was also recently paved. The colour of the road was pitch black and created a very nice contrast to the grey rugged hill on the side.
The Badlands National Park visitor center was beside Cedar Pass Lodge. Cedar Pass Lodge was also the only lodge inside Badlands National Park. The Badlands National Park visitor center was quite interesting. There was actually a fossil lab inside the visitor center. Tourists can go into the lab and check out the work done by the technicians.
As we drove towards West, there were more overlooks. We pulled over at every single overlook. The Fossil Exhibit Trail was a very short board walk trail. It showed the type of fossils that could be found at Badlands National Park.
At Panorama Point, we could see very far to the South. We could also see the grass land on the far side. This is also the best overlook for people to do stargazing. We also came here at night and we could see the Milkyway on the South side very clearly.
We then got to Yellow Mounds Overlook. This was an interesting overlook because it has different colour than other places. The colour of the hill is yellow instead of grey. This is due to different age of fossil is in this type of hills and presents in different colour.
The last overlook we got to is Pinnacles Overlook. This overlook has some walking path for people to walk further into the land formation. This is one of the best overlook for viewing the sunset because this overlook faces towards West. At this overlook, we also saw several mountain goats on the far side of the cliff.
Badlands National Park has really impressed us. It was a much better experience than what we were expecting. The landscape here was simply beautiful and unimaginable. We would definitely come here again and enjoy the breeze of wind here.
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