1880s Town & The Badlands

As a spectator from the side watching my kids have their fun while holding a baby, one sight made me want to quickly pass the baby on for a bout of goofiness. South Dakotas rolling hills start where one ends and are small enough for one to run up and down over and over again until one falls over from laughter or exhaustion. I felt like grabbing a ball and letting it go to see where it would end up. Unfortunately, there were fences everywhere preventing me from fulfilling this childish whim.

We came upon an old 1880s town preserved and used in the movie Dances With Wolves. Our house back in Connecticut was also built in that year so it was interesting to see how life was in that time. Horse and buggy, saloons, baths in the rear of an inn, red corncob to wipe your ass, white to see if you need another red one. Riley was happy to be alive in today’s era with modern conveniences; however, she wished everyone still wore those long frilly dresses and hats. Ah, the Ruby gene.

Preparing your kids to see and explore The Badlands is fun. I told my kids that we were going to a place that looks totally different than anything they have ever seen. Imagine a pink moon surface with bizarre rock formations, but with gravity. And that damn gravity caused a lot of scrapes and mishaps. I don’t know why my kids must run full speed to every cliff’s edge, or why they must climb the steepest cliff faster than a mountain goat and then get stuck on a ledge, but for the most part of the day my nerves were shot.

While driving through the Badlands National Park I asked to stop about every 1,000 feet to take pictures. There are lower yellow layers of exposed rock, which is from the time the dinosaurs roamed the earth. I don’t know about you, but feeling connected to the past is fascinating to me and this gave me great satisfaction.

We bought the boys slingshots and went out together to shoot some tourists. They were quickly confiscated and not returned until Mt. Rushmore, our next stop.