Badlands National Park An Accurate Name for the Place

As if Mount Rushmore and Wall Drug didn't provide enough character to South Dakota, driving through Badlands National Park to get out of Wall proved the natural landscape can keep up with any man-made weirdness South Dakotans can come up with.

The land is a funky mix of grassy plains, lush mini-valleys and heavily-eroded and beautifully striated rocks, with some winding roads. From the higher ridges you can see the Black Hills off in the west, and to the east, nothing but grass. In fact it's situated in the middle of the largest undisturbed grass prairie in the United States.

Our first view of it.

We didn't stay long, as we were on the way to Mitchell to check out some vegetable-based architecture, but BNP is also one of those places you can get a pretty good grasp of in a fairly short amount of time.

I promise the camera was level.

What happens when get smart with her.