April 6, 2012

This was an awesome day. I slept in after a late night last night. Around 10:30 Ryan (law enforcement for the park) came and knocked on my door with an offer to tag along with him for the day. We drove through some of the Buffalo Gap grasslands area adjacent to the park and did some rock hunting in the Baja area. I asked why it was called that, and he said it's named after Baja California where people drive all over the rough terrain. This area today was pretty incredible to drive through. Gorgeous colors in the hills, but the 'road' (two tire marks) takes you up and down and along the crests of the hills that are just wide enough at the top for a truck to fit. The soil here is loose and crumbly, so it all feels unstable and a bit crazy to drive on in a huge truck. It was like being on a roller coaster where you can't quite see what's coming next. We then drove through the South Unit of Badlands NP, which is pretty remote and requires a high clearance vehicle. Those roads take you into creek beds a few dozen times or more, some with very steep, tall sides that you have to drive down and up. Much of it is heavily rutted and bouncy. Some intense yet fun driving today; it was really cool. Saw a herd of bison, too, in the South Unit. As we came around the west side of Sheep Mountain, the sky got pretty dark off on the horizon. That grew into an ominous thunderhead with amazing clouds, strong wind, some good lightening, and heavy rain. We had the windows down with the wind whipping through the cab. Awesome. The rain hit just a little while before we made it off the HCV dirt (not gravel) road. We got back onto pavement just in time. The soil here becomes a gooey muddy mess like quick sand when it's wet. You don't drive off pavement/gravel in the rain or there's a very good chance you'll get stuck. The rain/lightening/thunder really hit hard once we were on pavement, driving back towards Interior. We out-drove the storm, and so then got to watch it approach a second time from the quad. It was about dinner time, and we headed to the Cowboy Corner in Interior for the friday special and met up with some others. Cowboy Corner is the gas station in town, but on fridays the owner cooks chicken fried steak. The amount of food she loaded onto everyone's plate was incredible. Mine had four large pieces of steak, a giant mound of potatoes and gravy, plus a big dinner roll and salad to start. Yum. Wish I'd thought to take a photograph before eating. After a long day of hiking around, I polished it all off. Back and the quad now, typing this, and getting ready to download photos from my camera. I think I got some fantastic shots today. In a little bit I'm going to bring some ice cream over to Ryan's and watch a movie.

Today was an unexpected adventure way out of the realm of my normal life. Thanks, Ryan!