Bucyrus, North Dakota

My Aunt and Uncle's house in Bucyrus, North Dakota. I should have taken a picture of the driveway. I still have a scar on my knee compliments of falling in that gravel driveway.


My Grandparents home. Mother spent most of her growing up years in this house. It seems to be in better shape that my Aunt and Uncle's home.


I spent most of the day in the south unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Took lots of photos. Saw Prairie dogs, Bison, feral Horses, and Pronghorn antelope. No photos of the latter, but quite a few of the previous. And lots of scenery photos. Just got back to the motel a little less than an hour ago, so will have a busy remainder of the evening going through photos. Tomorrow it's the north unit of the park.

More Badlands

A couple of photos from Wednesday evening in the Badlands.

From the looks of the moon this evening, I missed a full moon by one evening.


Sunset as I was leaving the park


The rest of the photos from the Badlands are here

I've concluded that one needs two mornings in the Badlands, and two evenings. One morning to go east and see and photograph from that angle, and a morning to go west and see and photograph. Repeat process for the evenings. Also probably need to schedule in a couple of extra days to accomodate weather.

I headed north today. Only covered about 250 miles, but I dawdled along the way and it took all day to get to Dickinson ND. After Miz Winnie and I got settled in, I laid down and took a 3 hour nap. Guarantees messing up the nights sleep!

I stopped for a good bit of time in Bucyrus, ND. It's the town where my mother was born and raised. Easily located the home of my aunt and uncle and my grandparents. Both are in disrepair. Was suprised how small they were. I was last there in my early teens and they seemed larger in my memories. Drove around the town a bit and finally found a man outside working on his RV. He allowed that he had lived there since 1968. Was able to confirm that the houses that I believed to be family homes were in fact, family homes. He told me where the cemetary was. Spent a good bit of time there. Never did find the graves of my grandparents, or my aunt and uncle. Lots of small town cemetaries are well kept, but this one isn't. It appeared that the grass isn't mowed with any frequency, and when it is, no one takes the time to clean off the markers. I guess the moral of the story is that one should have an upright marker. For some reason or another, it was an emotionally draining experience. Something I hadn't really expected. Haven't yet looked at the pictures I took today...

Theodore Roosevelt National park is the next photgraphy spot.

Badlands National Park and Buffalo Gap National Grassland

Whew! I'm going to get caught up. This morning I went back to the Badlands. I haven't been very happy with the photos I've been getting there, so I changed cameras. Think that was a good idea.

We came to the Badlands either the first or second summer I lived in Nebraska. I don't remember being as impressed with the Badlands on that trip. I'm not particularly good with adjectives, but I have just been awestruck by this landscape. Perhaps that's been part of my frustration with the photos I've been getting. They just haven't seemed to represent the grandeur of what I was seeing. Think I did a little better today. Here's a couple of photos from today.





I then headed south out of the park into the Buffalo National Grassland. I did find one Pronghorn antelope. Kind of scruffy looking!


A Lark bunting chose to pose.


Going to the park in a few minutes and see if I can get some more sunset photos.

Buffalo Gap National Grassland

Yesterday, I headed south of Badlands NP, partly to get away from the hordes in the park, and partly because I thought seeing critters and birds might be easier elsewhere. I was particulary hopeful of finding of some Pronghorn antelope. I saw some, but they were well out of camera range.

I did see this mare and foal


I stopped by the little town of Scenic and enjoyed the humor of the lady and rolling pin chasing the man


This immature Horned lark seemed pretty proud of catching a grasshopper.

Badlands National Park Sunset

I wanted to put up Monday evenings photos from the Badlands last night. Don't know if pbase (photo site) was having a problem, or if it was the connection here, but the photos I wanted to put up were'nt loading. Just a big black square. The thumbnails were fine, but no photo. Same thing this morning. So I've reloaded them, and at least some of them are showing up.

Anyway, here's a couple of sunset photos from Badlands National Park.