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★ Worth Making Time For

Badlands National Park

About an hour southeast of Rapid City, the Badlands rise out of the South Dakota prairie as a jagged maze of striped spires and pinnacles in pink, orange, and white. Badlands has an official Open Hike Policy, so visitors can step off the trail and wander the formations freely. Big Badlands Overlook faces east and makes a superb sunrise spot, and along a short trail nearby, cliff swallows tend mud nests packed close together. Come in May or September, when the light is low, the air is cool, and the summer crowds are gone.

Badlands National Park
Firsthand Pick, HannahOutThere
Why this one matters

With the freedom to leave the trail, exploring here feels personal rather than scripted. Beneath the scenery, the eroding hills hold one of the world's richest beds of ancient mammal fossils, and the Fossil Exhibit Trail plus the working fossil lab at the Ben Reifel Visitor Center make that deep time tangible. Where to stay: Cedar Pass Lodge offers cabins inside the park, with the Cedar Pass Campground right next door. The nearest town with hotels is Wall, about 10 minutes from the Pinnacles entrance, home of the classic roadside stop Wall Drug. Nearby, the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site and the bison herds of Sage Creek Basin are both worth the detour.

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