Stephanie and I looked forward to returning to Badlands National Park for a day. It’s a very accessible park (just a short drive from Rapid City), well laid out for visitors, has great views, and is relatively crowd free.
As it turned out, our visit to the park in 2025 mirrored our first visit here in 2010 with only a few minor changes. One main road goes through the park, so everyone pretty much follows the same route. You have to work hard to do something different.
We entered the park at the Northeast Entrance about 3:30 PM, heading west on Badlands Loop Road. Our plan was to stay in the park until sunset. We checked the weather forecast in Rapid City before leaving. Partly sunny and 75° F (24° C) seemed just right.
On arrival we quickly learned that the forecast was a bit off. In the park it was 85° F (30° C) with full sun. A lot hotter than we expected and zero shade.
Our first stop was at the Big Badlands Overlook. Yep, nice views. Hadn’t changed much, if at all, since 2010.
Next we went to the Door Trail / Window Trail / Notch Trail area. Door Trail and Window Trail are short boardwalks that lead to different viewpoints. Nice, but nothing special. At least at Door Trail you can hop off the boardwalk and go cross country across the badlands.
We skipped Notch Trail because it is a longer walk and, at the end, involves climbing up a short ladder. This did not seem like that much fun on a hot day in full sun.
A four mile loop hike around the Castle Trail and Medicine Root Trail was next on the to do list, but a hot day with full sun put an end to that idea rather quickly. Instead we stopped in at the visitor center to cool off for a bit just before it closed for the day.
Since we skipped our planned four mile hike, we decided to walk the Cliff Shelf Nature Trail, which somehow manages to include boardwalks, gravel, stairs, and dirt in a 0.9 mile loop. The best view is found just a few steps from the parking lot. We spent the entire trail looking for better views that never materialized.
If you want to stretch your legs, walk the loop. If you are stopping for the views, don’t venture far from the parking lot.
Around 5:00 PM we noticed that clouds and winds were rolling in, dropping the temperature by about 10° F and providing some much-needed shade.
We took this opportunity to walk the Castle Trail for about one mile out and then back from the Old Northeast Road trailhead. The first mile was straight into the wind. We had a tailwind on the return. All in all a decent, flat and very easy, walk.
Resuming our drive west on Badlands Loop Road, we made a quick stop at the White River Valley Overlook. Nice viewpoint, but you can’t see the river as it is several miles away.
Since it was dinner time, next up was a stop at Big Foot Pass Overlook. Not because the views from here are anything special (they’re not), but because this overlook has picnic tables and a restroom. Unfortunately it was now way too windy to even consider eating outside, so we had our picnic dinner inside the car.
Continuing west on Badlands Loop Road we made quick stops at Panorama Point, Burns Basin, and Homestead Overlook, barely avoiding being blown over at these locations.
One family had not yet learned to only open one car door at a time when the wind is blowing fiercely. We saw a couple of hats, a map, brochure, paper wrappers, and a half-eaten bag of chips go flying out of a minivan when three doors were opened at the same time.
Homestead Overlook seems like it could have great sunset views when the sky cooperates. For us the cloud cover was too low and too dark for even a decent sunset. I could have braved the winds for a great sunset, but it was not meant to be.
Next up on the tourist itinerary is the stop at Yellow Mounds. In sunlight the mounds are really yellow. In rapidly darkening skies, not so much.
For no particular reason we turned south off Badlands Loop Road onto Conata Road, probably because we did not drive down this road during our previous visit to the park. What a stroke of luck. We came across a bison in a small field who decided to take a dust bath in a dirt patch about twenty yards from our car. We spent more time watching this bison roll around in the dirt than we did at any overlook.
At 7:30 PM we reached our final stop, the Pinnacles Overlook. Still dark, still windy. And it was getting cold. The temperature had now dropped to 65° F (18° C). After a quick look around, it was time to go. Shortly thereafter we drove out of the park at the Pinnacles Entrance Station to head back to Rapid City.
Maybe we should have taken the time on this trip to visit the White River Visitor Center and that section of the park in the Pine Ridge Reservation, but we did not. I guess that will be something new for us to do the next time we are in the area.
It is impossible to visit both Badlands National Park and Theodore Roosevelt National Park and not draw a comparison between the two. Badlands are the main feature of both parks. And they have bison and prairie dogs. But that is where the similarities begin and end.
Badlands National Park is a nice day trip from Rapid City, but nothing more. Come to this park for the views of the badlands themselves. The park has few established hiking trails and seemingly little wildlife. We saw a couple of deer, bison, and prairie dogs, but not many. Badlands National Park is definitely worth visiting if you are in the area, but it is not a destination park.
Theodore Roosevelt National Park, on the other hand, has better views, miles of hiking trails, and abundant wildlife. Unfortunately, the park is in the middle of nowhere. It is a destination park out of necessity, but a worthwhile one.
If you have time, definitely visit both.
Hiking in Badlands National Park:
Castle Trail: 2.0 miles
Garrett and Stephanie
To read other posts about our adventures in the National Parks and National Monuments, or elsewhere in the world, check out our Travel Blog. It contains collected links to all of our travel posts.
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