Badlands

If you've never been there, be assured that the Badlands is a huge place. Just a few minutes before I snapped this picture, I'd been down on that parking lot talking to the bearded dad of a Minnesota family who drove up and backed into a parking stall, then let out the kids and the dog. Don't know where the dog is, but one of the kids is visible up against the yellowish slant of hill off the far corner of the parking lot. She's just a sliver in the expanse, but you can tell it's a someone by the slight shadow she's casting up against that side of the hill. There's a whole lot of bad land to the Badlands.

flat 

There's so much space, in fact, that it's almost impossible to get it all in the lens. My flattest wide-angle promises to get the close-in stuff as well as the waaaaaaay far-out stuff in focus. You'll have to be the judge, but this is about the best I can do at long shots. They're big bad lands, and they don't necessarily take kindly to being photographed.

For the record, let there be no doubt that this is "bad land." Ain't nobody going to get a crop here, and not even buffalo would find it worth their time to graze this mess of rock and sand. Which is not to say they're not around. 

Or that these incredible Badlands don't nurture their own four-leggeds. 

Interstate 90 was remarkably empty on Saturday, Covid keeping most people home for the holidays. By mid-morning just few cars wandered the Badlands, not many--and that's okay. I've been there when every parking lot is full. 

The Badlands are not a place to enjoy in a crowd, even though there's no end to the room. Last year, in early morning January cold, I stopped by, pretty much alone. Saturday, I wasn't. But there was no noise, which is its own kind of Christmas blessing. The place is meant to be huge and silent. 

Like I said, there's a girl just visible in that first shot, top of the page. You've got to look to see her, but when you do you realize the sheer, jaw-dropping expanse of all this "bad land."

That slivered shadow of a presence is what we all are when we're here in the heart of the Badlands.