Badlands, and wind cave S. Dakota that bad?
yahoo travel did a recent article on the 5 worst National Parks. Badlands, and Wind Cave were both on the list. As we are planning a trip to S. Dakota in June/July, I was wondering if any of you agree...
Forum Discussion
Here's a thought on Wind Cave NP:
We've not been into the actual cave, but there are a couple of gravel roads/two track roads that lead from Custer State Park into Wind Cave National Park. These are roads that stem off of the Wildlife Loop in Custer SP. We have a Dodge 2500 pickup, so we aren't afraid to go down some primitive roads when exploring. We thoroughly enjoyed venturing into Wind Cave NP and saw some very neat herds of buffalo. The great thing was that we weren't in a traffic jam on a paved road along with 25 other vehicles. It was just us driving through a couple of herds with no one around. Kind of reminded me of the movies where you see a vast herd running along the hills with no signs of modern living.
I guess my comment is that any National Park is what you make of it. Take some time to explore. I had a friend that worked for the NPS at Everglades and he often said that 95% of visitors would be happy if they just chained an alligator outside the visitor center. Then people could come, see the gator (which was all they were interested in) and then go on their way to Disneyworld. The National Parks are great places if you just take the time to really see them.
We've not been into the actual cave, but there are a couple of gravel roads/two track roads that lead from Custer State Park into Wind Cave National Park. These are roads that stem off of the Wildlife Loop in Custer SP. We have a Dodge 2500 pickup, so we aren't afraid to go down some primitive roads when exploring. We thoroughly enjoyed venturing into Wind Cave NP and saw some very neat herds of buffalo. The great thing was that we weren't in a traffic jam on a paved road along with 25 other vehicles. It was just us driving through a couple of herds with no one around. Kind of reminded me of the movies where you see a vast herd running along the hills with no signs of modern living.
I guess my comment is that any National Park is what you make of it. Take some time to explore. I had a friend that worked for the NPS at Everglades and he often said that 95% of visitors would be happy if they just chained an alligator outside the visitor center. Then people could come, see the gator (which was all they were interested in) and then go on their way to Disneyworld. The National Parks are great places if you just take the time to really see them.
