You might have a favorite campsite on a windswept precipice over the Pacific. Or a special, mosquito-net window on the Grand Canyon or the Chilkoot Trail. Very dramatic. But how pleasant is this scene of North Dakota badlands in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, with the Little Missouri flowing slowly under cloudy skies.
This is a good time to visit the state that even South Dakotans think is remote and austere. Yes, the prairie can be boiling in late summer, and the winds can scour your skin. But the evenings and mornings will be gentle, and the air is sometimes prickly with sage, and your evening drive through the park might be interrupted by wandering bison, so close to your dusty car that you start wondering about deductibles.
Though TRNP is open year-round, you only have a few months of the year when it’s practical to camp there. (The other months, Roosevelt said, the place is “an abode of iron desolation.”) During these good months, count on a canopy of stars. Crickets. An occasional train whistle. An easy place to roll over in the sleeping bag and hope someone else wants that first cup of coffee more than you do.
Photo of Cottonwood Campground in the South Unit, TRNP by B.B. deRaffe.
