Out of Our Rut: Good Times in the Badlands Part 2

Map of this blog's locations click this link to open the map

There was one section of the Badlands that doesn’t get much attention but we had heard it was a pretty spectacular spot - Sheep Mountain Table. There are probably a couple of reasons it doesn’t draw many visitors. First, it is definitely out of the way being about 38 miles from Interior entrance to the park. Second, that drive only gets you to the dirt road that goes up to Sheep Mountain. We had asked at the visitor center about the road conditions and the ranger said it was fine for the first 5 miles to an overlook. The remaining 2.5 to 3 miles will be a bit more challenging. We set off in the morning and headed out. We did a short detour along the way to the old abandoned town of Conata. Apparently a once thriving railroad town, there isn’t much remaining. However a fellow geocacher was nice enough to place a cache at one of the old home foundations which got us to a place few will see. There was an old car abandoned here as well.

In Need of TLC

We continued on along State Route 44 and turn at the town of Scenic. Maybe at one point in time, this place was “scenic”, but today it appears to be heading to the same fate as the town of Conata. The drive up Sheep Mountain Road wasn’t too bad. Not many potholes or even washboard areas like we might expect. Most of it would easily accommodate vehicles coming the opposite direction. We didn’t have any traffic until we had driven the 5 miles to the overlook. There were two other cars here with 7 people and a dog taking in the wonderful views. We chatted with the other people for a bit and one car full said they planned on driving to the end of the road “because it was there”! They were driving a Chrysler 300 which is isn’t really known for its off-road prowess. As they pulled out, they stopped at the sign stating “high clearance vehicles only”. I thought that may have put some sense in them, but they decided to keep going. I’m not sure they went another 100 feet before they stopped and started to back up. Apparently backing up wasn’t one of the driver’s skill since I heard them run into a large rock denoting the side of the road. At least they didn’t seem to do much damage nor did they get stuck and block our path in.

View at Main Overlook Sheep Mountain

After both of the cars were long gone, we hop in the Jeep to see just how far this thing would take us. The road was quite rutted and I could hear the tall grasses in the center of the road scraping along the bottom but we never hit anything substantial. There were plenty of muddy sections to navigate around or thru. We made lots of stops along the way to take in the new views we come upon. I did learn something about the Jeep I hadn’t realized before. It comes with a voice command system that warns of upcoming hazards and even suggests to just stop and walk. There didn’t seem to be any way of turning off this system or even adjusting the volume. About 2 miles in from the overlook, as I tried to negotiate a washed out section of road, the warning system had gotten quite loud and adamant about stopping. It was at this point that my internal tilt sensor was starting to trigger and I decided Chris was right! I managed to turn around and find a place to park that was out of the way in case some other fool attempts to drive past us. We walk the remaining half mile or so until there is no further to go with the trail ending at a steep drop off. I suspect some sort of 4 wheeler might have been able to make it most of the way to the end of Sheep Mountain Road. We definitely had the place to ourselves. It wasn’t until we had gotten back to the car and driven a mile, that we saw another SUV heading out. We found a spot to get by one another and they continued on their way. I was curious as to how far they made it towards the end. We stopped and had our picnic at the first overlook and really enjoyed the peacefulness of the spot.

Nice Views Further along Sheep Mountain Road

A Fork in the Road

Reminds us of Chiricahua National Monument in Arizona

Instead of just heading back to camp, we drove up Sage Creek Road to enter the park again at the Pinnacles Entrance. This got us to stop to look at prairie dogs and a bison along the way.

Lone Bison Along Road

A Pair at Attention

During the drive through the park, we came upon another spot where a handful of cars were pulled over. We saw some bighorn sheep and figured it was worth checking them out. It turned out to be a great stop. There were probably 15 to 20 of them scattered in amongst the rocks. I think I counted 10 very young ones. I suspect we stayed there for a good 45 minutes. We had seen one of the adults heading in the direction of our car but lost track of it. When we finally decide to move on, we head back to the car and Chris climbs up a small hill for one last look. Unbeknownst to her, the one bighorn sheep was in the small valley just a few feet below her. The sheep was startled and bolted up the hill while Chris let out a big shriek. The rest of the drive back to camp was uneventful.

There were two more of the popular hikes we hadn’t done yet and rain was expected after lunch so we headed back over to the Notch Trail. We knew this hike would push Chris’ limits and the sign at the trailhead didn’t do a lot to reassure her. It’s not a long hike, maybe 1.5 miles round trip. But what it lacks in length, it makes up for it in challenges for those with fear of heights. The start of the hike is fine through some of the rock formations but part way in, we are greeted with our first climb. The park service is nice enough to provide a cross between stairs and a ladder. Initially the slope is easy enough to simply walk up the stairs but halfway thru it needs to be climbed more like a ladder. The step or rung spacing wasn’t very uniform and some of them seemed to be fairly far apart even for someone with rather long legs. Chris took her time and safely made it to the top.

Notch Trail Warning Sign

The Start of Notch Trail

Stairs/Ladder Up

Looking Back Down!

View Back Towards Stairs/Ladder

Cactus in South Dakota!?!

The next challenge was a section with a couple of narrow paths right on the edge of rock hill. It was narrow but it was manageable. There is then a short rise up to an overlook - the Notch apparently. The view is directly over the Cliff Shelf walk we had done a few days earlier. Now we know where the people we saw from below had come from when we saw them standing on the edge of the cliff. On the way back from the notch, we saw an interesting place to the right and decided to check it out. Turns out there is a second notch to look out from.

Keep Right!

No, Keep Left!

View from the Notch

Path Back to Second Notch

View at Second Notch

Flower in Inhospitable Conditions

Coming back down was a tad more difficult and we had a bit of a traffic jam at the stairs. There was one woman waiting her turn that was barefoot! I’m not sure how she could handle the sharp rocks along the trail. We made it down and headed back to the Door trail to do the rest of the walk that proceeds beyond the boardwalk area. There are some nice views from here as well.

View Near End of Door Trail

We headed back to the visitor center because the paleontology lab should be open now. There were two people carefully working on some fossils while a third person was greeting visitors and answering questions. The tool used to prepare the fossils looked like something from a dentist office but rather than a rotary tool, they function like a mini-jackhammer. They have a wide assortment of fossils on display and it was an interesting place to check out. Then we headed across the road from the visitor center to search out some erosion markers that had been placed back in July 2011. It was part of an earthcache where we needed to locate four pieces of rebar that had been pounded into the ground nearly 8 years ago and take some measurements of how much is exposed today. One of the markers had 6 inches more exposed since being installed.

Hyracodon

The Big Pig

Careful Cleaning

View Near Erosion Markers

For our last full day in the Badlands, we were running out of things to do. Or at least we thought that was the case. There was a virtual geocache (one that doesn’t have a container to find) named “Old Homestead”, 5 or 6 miles north of the park that required a 2 mile round trip walk to get there. It sounded interesting and so off we went. We had just turned off Badlands Loop Road onto Big Foote Road to start the long dusty drive, when I noticed something in the field on both sides of the road. At first I figured it was simply white-tailed deer and was ready to just drive by. But I could see there was something different about these deer. We stopped and checked them out with the binoculars and discovered they were pronghorn. While technically not of the antelope family, they are often called that. This was our first real good look at them so I got the camera out for some pictures. Even though they were over 150 feet away, they didn’t seem too appreciative of my watching them so closely and they headed off, as did we.

Pronghorn at Alert

There isn’t much out Big Foote Road except for cattle (and a few pronghorn). We were within a couple miles of I-90 when we got to our parking spot. The “road” back to the old homestead looked in good enough shape that the Jeep would have made it without problem, but there was a no motor vehicle sign at the start so we were good and walked. There wasn’t much left of the place. There were a couple piles of large decaying timbers that must have been the home and barn back in the day. There was a nice pond although it seems likely to be seasonal in nature since the trees in it were still alive. It was neat to walk around such a desolate spot and imaging what it might have been like to try to make a living off the land here a hundred years ago.

Guess We're Walking

Cattle Feed and Water Station?

Remnants of Barn

Lake on Homestead

From here we head back into the park and head to the Conata Picnic area to eat our lunch. As we circled for a parking spot, we noticed a trailhead sign to a trail we didn’t know existed. It was called the Deer Haven Trail but wasn’t on the official park map. We figured we might as well give it a try after lunch. The trail isn’t well marked and apparently not hiked by many visitors because it wasn’t super easy to follow. But there was enough of a foot path thru the grassy areas that we seemed to stay on what we considered a trail. The trail skirted along some of the big hills that look to be made of mud but was more or less flat. There were a few lower spots that were either wet or muddy from recent rains but that didn’t deter us from continuing on. Of course we didn’t know how far of a hike it was to Deer Haven and the sun was pretty fierce as we pushed on. After about 2 miles we came around one set of hills and were greeted by more hills but with large expanses of trees in between them.

Along Deer Haven Trail

View of Hills to North

Approaching Deer Haven

The trailhead sign had mentioned this was one of the few areas in Badlands NP with large numbers of trees. We worked our way over towards the trees, but there were lots of small streams of water running down from the hills they were on. Had they been dry creek beds like they probably are most of the time, it would have been rather straightforward to get there. As it was, we decided we had had enough and turned around at about the 2.5 mile mark without seeing one deer in the process. With any luck, another 2.5 miles would get us back to the car. On the way back, I started to think about how many (or few) people take this hike each year. The two of us did it today, so if I assume two people hike it every day, that would make 730 people annually. Of course the park doesn’t get much traffic in the cold winter months so let’s assume 500 people hike to Deer Haven each year. The park gets an estimated one million visitors per year so we are in the top (or bottom?) 0.05%. Something to think about!