Badlands Moonrise

Norbeck Pass, Badlands National Park, South Dakota

I have been going through the images that I shot last month at Badlands National Park and they have confirmed that the park has to be one of my very favorite places. The landscape has everything that a photographer could ask for: jagged buttes, twisted canyons, rugged spires and rock formations in the shape of domes often striped in different colors. All of these contrast greatly with prairies on either side of the park.

The formations and buttes form what it is known as the Wall. It extends for 100 miles. Approximately 31 of those miles is paved and easy accessible on Route 240, otherwise known as Badlands Loop Road. North of the Wall, there is nothing but plains and the formations cannot be seen.  Coming from the south, the formations can't be missed, showing a sort of natural "skyline".

This image was taken from Norbeck Pass on the other side of the jagged peaks that I shot here.  It shows an almost- full moon lighting up the dome-like formations with their colorful striations. It is amazing to realize how close these two type of formations are from one another.