I was totally unprepared for that revelation called the Dakota Badlands…What I saw gave me an indescribable sense of mysterious elsewhere — a distant architecture, ethereal…an endless supernatural world more spiritual than earth but created out of it.
— Frank Lloyd Wright
Date Created: Badlands National Park was designated a national monument on January 25, 1939, and it was redesignated as a national park on November 10, 1978.
Location: Southwestern South Dakota, USA.
Size: Approximately 244,000 acres (98,743 hectares).
If you enjoy wide open spaces, Badlands will feel like home. Breath deep and enjoy the quiet. Gigantic, stark rock formations appear rugged and dry but spectacular. Conversely, this park holds the distinction of hosting one of the largest expanses of mixed grass prairie in the United States. Fossils from the Oligocene period (23 – 35 million years ago) make this a paleontologist dream. Weather is a factor as summers are hot and dry with unexpected thunderstorms; winters are cold with an average temperature of 26 degrees (F).
