Miles: 428.3
States: North Dakota, Montana
Fun Facts:
It's against the law for convenience stores to open before noon on Sunday, however, oil drillers work 24/7
According to the woman at the gas station, the only way to get a bottle of sunscreen in North Dakota bigger than an 8 oz tube is to order it off of Amazon.
Evidently there are rattlesnakes in the North Dakota Badlands, or so the signs said.
Side note: Danny's Magic Tree House Survival Guide has instructions for surviving a T-Rex attack but not a Rattlesnake attack.
During most of the drive from Dickinson to Livingston your radio will only be able to supply one station. It will inevitably be something you can't bear to listen to.
Memories:
Grace: When we were hiking up the trail in the Badlands and my hat blew off! Discovering the little mini dinosaur museum at the visitor's center.
Danny: When we were hiking in windy canyon I had so many worries because I forgot my survival book. Before we met the horses we went into the park that was all about dinosaurs. When a mom horse and a baby horse came into the picnic shelter. Listening to the prairie dogs.
Therese: When the herd of horses joined us for lunch. Driving the beautiful curvy roads into the mountains of Montana. All the detail of the Range Rider's museum including an iron lung.
Gordon: Risking my life to save Grace's hat and thus the environment
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It was a long day so this is a short update.
We had a very restful night. Grace and I were the early risers and put together our Yellowstone camping menus and shopping lists during our delicious, free breakfast.
Although we had a relatively early start, loading up the car and getting gas seemed to eat up a lot of time.
We arrived at our first stop, Medora, ND around 11:00. The Theodore Roosevelt National Park surrounds Medora which is the Badlands of ND. Thank goodness for "Night at the Museum." Our kids were able to immediately identify Robin Williams, I mean Teddy Roosevelt in the display at the visitor's center.
Our timeline was significantly delayed because we couldn't tear ourselves away from North Dakota - - yes you heard me right. Medora is very beautiful and we marveled that the terrain changed almost immediately from flat lands one moment to canyons the next.
We not only saw free ranging buffalo in the park, but many, many prairie dogs. We were able to pull over and get out of the car to see prairie dogs popping in and out of their homes. Their cute squeaking noises reminded us of our Guinea Pig.
We drive about 1/3 of the way through the park and took a short loop hike before heading to Montana.
It was tempting to take the hour long drive all the way through the park but we knew there were more badlands in our future and the hour was getting late.
We had planned to zip through Medora and then make a stop every two hours for our next six hours of driving, but we were so far behind schedule that it was already lunch time so we decided to have lunch at Makoshika State Park, just over the Montana Border.
We were really glad we did - it was a larger and even more stunning version of Medora and we were able to have our picnic right in the sandstone canyons. Just as we started to eat, a beautiful horse wandered over to our picnic shelter, then another and another and two mothers with foals. They were beautiful and clearly not wild horses. At one point an adult and a foal wandered through the shelter. We had fun making up stories about how they came to be running wild in the canyons. Just as we finished making up a story about how they had run away from a mean owner, a very crabby rancher rolled up in his pickup truck and hustled them off. We later learned that a section of fence was down and the horses regularly checked in on visitors.
Our next planned stop was the Range Rider's Museum in Miles City, two hours away. It was already getting late but we needed to switch drivers and it was National Ice Cream day so we needed to stop anyway...
The Range Rider's Museum is truly a labor of love. There are about 13 buildings crammed with very extensive collections of everything from saddles to broad axes to a cowboy hall of fame. There is also a nurse's hall of fame complete with an iron lung. I've always been fascinated by the iron lung so this was very interesting to me. I chatted with another visitor who said he had polio as a child and was terrified that he would have to go into an iron lung.
Each building seems to be curated by a very dedicated collector with hand pencilled notes on cardboard tags marking every item.
Someone even drew red arrows on all the visitor's maps showing the most efficient route a person could take to be sure to see EVERYTHING. While we were there, a Square Dance fundraiser was taking place which seemed to draw every cowboy and cowgirl over the age of 70 from the surrounding countryside.
By this time it was 4:30 and we still had about 4 hours of driving ahead of us. I was feeling pretty refreshed after the whole iron lung experience and the drive was breathtaking and suddenly NPR appeared on the radio so we powered through to our destination in Livingston.
Here we are now, nestled in the mountains, one hour's drive from Yellowstone.
Our hotel is not quite as nice as the last place. We have neither refrigerator nor microwave which creates a bit of a bump in the road for my menu planning. But there is a microwave in the lobby and the staff couldn't be more accommodating.
Tomorrow we'll explore either the Bozeman Dinosaur Museum or Chico Hot Springs or maybe both. Then we'll pack up and be ready to leave at 7:00 am the following day to begin our Yellowstone adventure!
'til then...here's one last picture of the hypnotic flat lands of North Dakota to help you fall asleep.
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