August 8 – 12, 2016: Custer State Park, SD to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, ND

We departed Center Lake Campground in Custer State Park on Monday, August 8, 2016 at 8:00 AM MDT.  The park has two different dump stations, one at Game Lodge Campground and the second at the campground for park employees.  We went to the second site since there are fewer obstacles.  I normally don’t mention this side of RV camping, but on this morning, we were interrupted in our duties by one of the park’s inhabitants.

This campground is on the eastern side of the park where we’d seen plenty of buffalo. We saw this guy as we were driving to the dump station and sure enough, he followed us. We had to wait in the truck while he finished rolling in the dirt and continued on his walk.

We also saw two deer nearby as we finished our work, but deer run away from humans, buffalo don’t.  The delay didn’t last too long and actually, it was kind of neat.

Our goal today was to reach Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota and the route would take us on mostly state highways.  The roads were just fine, so that wasn’t a problem, but we would have to pass through Sturgis, South Dakota.  It was motorcycle rally week at Sturgis and we weren’t sure how bad the traffic would be.  Well, there were thousands of motorcycles in Sturgis, but we managed to get through without any problems.  It was pretty interesting though to see how the city is transformed during rally week.  Citizens of Sturgis rent our their front yards so bikers can pitch a tent and camp.  One church offered free oil changes for bikers.  The high school opened its doors for free showers.  As I said, there were thousands of motorcycles about, but everything was orderly and relatively quiet.  I suppose driving through the city in the morning helped.  Anyway, it was an interesting experience.

We reached Medora, North Dakota relatively early in the afternoon.  Medora is a town of approximately 130 people and is the entrance of the South Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  There are three separate areas of the park, the South Unit as mentioned, the North Unit, which is about 70 miles to the north, and Elkhorn Ranch, which is an hour and a half drive northwest of Medora.  I’ll explain more about the park in a bit.

We wanted to camp in Cottonwood Campground in the South Unit, but this is a first come, first served campground and it fills up quickly.  We were too late to get a site on Monday, so we camped for one night at Red Trail Campground in Medora.  After setting up camp in Red Trail, we decided to drive to Cottonwood, just to see what the prospects were for getting a site Tuesday.  There were a number of sites that would vacate on Tuesday, so we would get up early and see how lucky we would be.  The campground was really nice and we noticed that wildlife abounded in this park as well.

Yes, buffalo were roaming through Cottonwood Campground. We would be safe inside our RV should the buffalo walk through the campground while we were there. Not sure about tents, but there were plenty of them and we didn’t hear of any incidents.

Now, a little about the park.  Theodore Roosevelt came to the Dakota Territory in 1883 to hunt buffalo in this area.  He loved this place and invested in a cattle ranch.  A year later, his first wife died two days after giving birth to their first child.  His mother had died just hours earlier on the same day (February 14) and in the same house.  Roosevelt was devastated by these deaths (who wouldn’t be?) and decided to return to the area and become a cattle rancher.  He could lose himself in this vast land.  He found that his first ranch, which was about 7 miles south of Medora, was a little too close to civilization, so he bought a second ranch and named it Elkhorn Ranch.  Elkhorn Ranch is part of the national park that bears his name and the cabin from his first ranch, the Maltese Cross Cabin, has been moved to the park’s Visitor Center in Medora.  The buildings from Elkhorn Ranch no longer exist, only stones mark the foundation.  The roads to the ranch are unpaved, steep, and can be washed out by storms, so we elected not to visit that part of the park.  Roosevelt returned to New York permanently after drought and blizzards in 1887 had destroyed his cattle herds, but his time here left an indelible mark on him.  As you may know, Theodore Roosevelt established the U.S. Forest Service, worked to create five national parks, although his namesake park was not one of them, 150 national forests, and many federal reserves.  Theodore National Park was originally established in 1947 as a national memorial park to honor Roosevelt and in 1978, it became a national park.  It is the only U.S. national park named after a person.

As planned, we drove back to Cottonwood Campground Tuesday morning and snagged a campsite, number 22.  The buffalo were still roaming around the campground, although they didn’t pose any problem as we set up camp at 10:20 AM MDT.

Most of the sites in the RV loop are pull-throughs, such as this one. The trees on the left side of the RV sheltered us from the road.

The South Unit is the largest of the three areas of the park.  I-94 touches the southern border of the park, in fact I-94 actually meanders through the park for a few miles.  Painted Canyon Visitor Center is a Rest Area along I-94 and a Visitor Center to the park.  The views from this location are outstanding and if you want, you can hike the Painted Canyon Trail.  The Visitor Center is the southern entrance point for this trail.  The hike down from the Visitor Center is steep and you will have to climb back up unless you want to continue the hike along another trail.  We just took in the views.  😉

After setting up camp, we drove back to the Visitor Center to see what was there.  We enjoyed an interpretive program on the Maltese Cross Cabin and were able to walk through parts of it.  In the Visitor Center, we learned about a couple of hiking trails and watched a movie about Theodore Roosevelt and the area.  After that, we drove parts of the Scenic Loop Drive, which is 36 miles long.  We just wanted to see what was in the park.  That night a storm cam through the area.  It rained hard, the wind blew, and it hailed.  Enduring a hailstone in an RV is a different experience for us, our first.  However, I have to believe we were better off than those who were tent camping.  When we checked our RV later, we did not notice any damage.  Yesss!

In the morning, Wednesday, August 10, we toured the Scenic Loop Drive again, this time stopping at locations of interest.  Along the way, we spotted some wildlife.

Not surprisingly, we spotted North Dakota buffalo. I’m not sure how they differ from South Dakota buffalo, but….

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Just like their counterparts in South Dakota, these buffalo like to stop traffic by standing in the middle of the road.

Of course, we saw prairie dogs, plenty of prairie dogs, turkeys, and something kind of unique to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, wild horses.

Like the buffalo, these wild horses roam freely throughout the park.

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Seeing this solitary horse on the top of the hill reminds me of the Old West.

The land here is very hilly, I suppose a little mountainous even, with deep ravines and gullies.  This area of North Dakota is known as the Badlands of North Dakota (not to be confused with Badlands National Park in South Dakota from my previous post).

You’ll notice the exposed layers of earth that have been eroded here. This is very reminiscent of Badlands National Park in South Dakota, but it is much greener here in North Dakota.

We stopped and hiked Coal Vein Trail, which was the site of a natural coal fire that eventually burned out by itself.  There are veins of coal, not high in quality, in these parts of North Dakota.  I believe a lightening strike in 1951 started a fire which slowly burned for 26 years.  We were told to pick up a trail guide at the beginning of the trail which would help us identify the effects of the burn, but unfortunately, we found no guides.  We hiked the trail anyway.

The weather here can be pretty severe. This old gnarled tree is a Rocky Mountain juniper. It has seen and endured its fair share of wind, rain, ice, snow, and beating sun.

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We also passed examples of bentonite clay. Ash from Rocky Mountain volcanoes fell on this area 55 million years. At the time, the land was a tropical swamp when the ash settled here. Bentonite clay kind of looks like popcorn when it is dry, but becomes very slick and muddy when wet. It can absorb up to five times its weight in water. I’m not sure what the yellow spot is, other than interesting.

After finishing that trail, we stopped at Buck Hill Trail which is the highest point in the South Unit and therefore offers a great view of the park.

We stood on the crest of this overlook and had a panoramic view of the area. You can see for miles and miles. We took plenty of photos from the viewpoint, but they all kind of look the same, so I’ll only make you look at one. 😉

After driving the Scenic Loop, we enjoyed a dinner back in Medora.  The town may be small, but it does cater to tourists, so we indulged ourselves.  We noticed that there are many temporary workers in Medora during the summer tourist season and many of them come from other countries.  Most of them liked Medora, although one did confess that there wasn’t much to do in the town outside of work.

We spent most of Thursday, August 11, at the campground.  We did hike from our RV site down to the Little Missouri River.  The river was fairly low this part of the season.  We didn’t try crossing it because the bottom is pretty muddy.  We didn’t feel like getting that dirty.

Friday, August 12, we elected to leave Cottonwood Campground at 8:10 AM MDT and traveled to Juniper Campground in the North Unit.  It’s about a 70 mile drive, but interestingly enough, the North Unit is in the CDT time zone.  So, we set up camp there at 10:45 AM CDT in site 5.

Juniper campground is also very nice. The RV loop has pull-through sites as well. As you can see, at the time my husband took this photo, he had just fired up the coals for dinner.

Since we staying here for only one night, we needed to do our sight-seeing the day we got there.  The Scenic Drive in the North Unit is a 14 mile drive one way.  Close to the campground, we made our first stop at the Cannonball Concretions Pullout.

This sign at the pullout explains what concretions are.

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But, a picture is worth a thousand words, so here is a large concretion close to that sign.

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The topography in the North Unit is similar to that of the South Unit. This photo was taken on the trail of the Cannonball Concretions Pullout.

That ridge seen in the photo above curved towards us and formed a rocky wall where more concretions could be seen.

Here are two more concretions slowly being exposed by erosion of the softer rock around them.

There was also other interesting rock formations found along this trail of the concretions wall.

This is a very interesting rock formation as well. I’m not exactly sure what it is, but think it may be a siderite nodule. What I do know is that I thought it was pretty cool.

Continuing on our way, we stopped at a couple of overlooks with great views of the land.  One was River Bend Overlook and the second was Oxbow Overlook.  We didn’t take photos at River Bend Overlook, but here are a couple from Oxbow Overlook.

The river in this photo is the Little Missouri River. Originally, the river flowed north to Hudson Bay, but during the most recent ice age, glaciers blocked its path. The river then took a turn to the east and formed an “oxbow”. The river is beginning its turn here in the photo.

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From the same spot, this photo shows the change in direction of the river.

My husband stitched the photos together to get a panoramic view from Oxbow Overlook.

You can now get a better sense of how the river makes the turn. It was quite a view.

The North Unit isn’t visited as much as the South Unit mainly because it is further away from interstate highways.  However, I have to say we really enjoyed our visit here.  We originally hadn’t planned to stop at the North Unit and I’m certainly glad we changed our minds.  That evening, we enjoyed the meal we were preparing when my husband took the photo of the campsite and then attended a ranger program.  I understand why Theodore Roosevelt loved this land.  You had to be tough and resilient to settle the area and frankly, still need to be so this day and age.  But, it’s quiet and vast and allows time for reflection.  If you have the opportunity to visit Theodore Roosevelt National Park, I don’t think you would be disappointed.