When we left the hotel in Watertown, South Dakota this morning, it was bright and sunny. Kenric and I were very happy because the weather has been crappy almost every day. However, it started raining as we got closer to Badlands National Park.

At the Visitor Center, we watched a 20-minute video about the park. I didn’t expect to cry but I did when it talked about the Lakota People who are part of the Sioux Tribe. The Lakota people were living in the area when the Europeans arrived. The video talked about an immigrant from Czechoslovakia who decided to come to America after seeing an ad in his local newspaper. The ad showed a big lush green plain and encouraged Czechs to migrate to America.

I felt especially sad when the video talked about how this Czech immigrant won a government lottery and was given land; land that the US government robbed from the Lakota people. As more immigrants from Europe arrived, the US Government took even more land from the tribe and gave it to the Europeans. Bison (referred to as buffalo in the video), which were very important to the natives, were hunted to near extinction. Finally, the Lakota people were forced to abandon their way of life and live on reservations.

Photos of the Wounded Knee Massacre which happened on December 29th, 1890 at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation were heartbreaking. US soldiers killed about 150 Lakota people, about half of them women and children. Many believe that the number killed is close to 300.

The clips of the wildlife were uplifting. However, with the rain, we didn’t expect to see any Prairie Dogs, Bighorn Sheep or bison; and definitely not the nocturnal Black-Footed Ferrets. So, when Kenric spotted a Bighorn Sheep at the top of a ridge, we were ecstatic. Then, we saw a few more. Not even two minutes later, we saw four bison. On our way back to Sioux Falls in late June, we’ll drive through the Badlands again. I hope we’ll have clear blue skies then because the videos and photos I took today do not do justice to the beauty of this national park at all.