This Rest Area Earthcache gives you an overview of the spectacular Badlands landscape that can be experienced from with the Theodore Roosevelt National Park units. The earthcache is handicap accessible via a paved sidewalk to the overlook.
The Sentinel Butte and Bullion Creek Formations in front of you, shows off its grand stratiography and thus is a striking example of erosion over the centuries. The Little Missouri River, that flows into the Missouri River/Mississippi River system, once flowed into Hudson Bay. However, during the Pliocene Epoch, great ice sheets blocked its flow north. The river was forced to the east and south and quickly cut its way through the soft sediment, to create the current grand landscape. Today, the Little Missouri River usually runs high during the winter and spring, though often running only inches deep during the long, dry summers. Sedimentary sediments -- Sand, clay, silt, shale and liginite coal, all different colors/shades, provide the colorful “painted” landscape in front of you. At times, sparked by lightening or grass fires the lignite coal veins may burn underground. The fierce heat bakes the surrounding rocks into red porcelanite (also called scoria or clinker) such as you see on the nearby hilltops. Huge house-sized masses may sheer from bluffs and creep downhill, this process is called slumping. Unlike landslides these slumpblocks remain intact and move so slowly that most shear scars weather away before the blocks finally come to rest. Such a collapse can be seen at the bottom of this viewpoint and throughout the park. Try to match the slumpblocks’ tilted strata with the horizontal bands on high exposed hillsides.
This rest area is accessible to both east and westbound traffic. It is located six miles east of the town of Medora, ND. Medora is the town at the entrance to the South Unit of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. This park rest area overlooks Painted Canyon, one of the many badlands canyons in this region of North Dakota.
If you enjoy this earthcache and the other interpretive panels available at this rest area, and you have 2-4 hours, you might wish to consider touring the South Unit’s 36-mile loop road with its many views of the Badlands geology.
Logging Requirements: Send the answers to #1-#3 to me through my geocaching profile.
1.List the name “GC238GK Painted Canyon Overlook Earthcache” in the first line of your email. Also, list the number of people in your group. (Done automatically if clicking through the messenger feature)
2.From the coordinates, look over the landscape and identify an example of slumping and describe which cardinal points closest match the slump you see (you are facing north if you are looking out over the canyon).
3.Also from the coordinates, realizing that the canyon in front of you is approximately 200 feet deep, how many years (range) did it take to form this canyon, based on annual erosion of 2-4 inches per year?
4. (Allowed as of 2019) Take a picture of yourself and/or your GPS with the canyon behind you. Please DO NOT include a picture that includes any interpretive signage! Old vacation photos are fine as long as you otherwise fulfill the earthcache. Please post this picture with your log at the same time that you post your log.
Answers to the above questions should be received at the same time as the log is posted. Failure to receive all logging requirements will result in your log being deleted. I will only respond if you have incomplete logging requirements. Go ahead and log your cache
Sources:
- Interpretive panels at location (in 2010, gone as of 2022)
- Roadlog Guide to the North and South Units of Theodore Roosevelt National Park (available for purchase at all park visitor centers)
- Wikipedia article “Theodore Roosevelt National Park”