The Badlands provided some good times. As it was Sunday, we had ourselves a little church service, playing music and reading out of Proverbs.
The sun rises early so we woke up before we had planned - it wasn't a disappointment though! The Badlands are so bizarre looking. Our campsite was on flat ground in a valley but these jagged formations shoot up out of nowhere...they kind of look like candy corn sticking up out of the ground.
We enjoyed a slow morning and headed to some hiking trails through the "mountains" (I'm not too sure what to call them).
We had to sign in and out of the trails because apparently people get lost out here. For me, that meant It was the perfect opportunity for me to don my best Bear Grylls accent and pretend we were surviving out in the elements, far from civilization!
Yes, I have a vivid imagination...
The trails went on for miles. We treated it as acclamation for North Carolina, because *holy cow* was it humid!
Alex led the way - pointing out the interesting plant life.
These cacti were growing atop a 6-foot little plateau. It really was indescribable what these sculpture-like mounds looked like up close.
At one point in the hike, we came across an area where people leave their marks arranging rocks into messages. We left ours:
A couple of hours into the trek, we came to a tall point that I decided would be a good idea to climb up. Why not? We carefully made our way up to the peak.
You can see the progression of how much windier it was at the top by the placement of my bangs. Above, they are a bit disheveled. Below, it gets worse...
But the view from up there was so worth the climb. I feel like I should insert something spiritual here about mountain highs and valleys and the risk being worth the result...but I'll just leave it for now and let the relation be obvious to those who would see it.
I have to say, I don't mind that we had to miss out on Mt. Rushmore if it meant getting to spend more time here. This is a place I would love to revisit sometime. The only downside was the Mosquitos. They ate me alive! I put on bug spray and everything (but they're probably immune to my hippie natural stuff...). Oh well, I guess the itching will give me something to remember that place by.
One of the best memories I'll come away from our visit to the Badlands with is of Cortney. He is a young man from Jamaica who is working at the park for the summer. Alex and I were working on some new music at our campsite when he drove by on his golf cart, checking the sites and whatnot. We could hear gospel music playing from his radio. Alex looked at me and I smiled. Alex walked over to where the young man was at the site next to us and introduced himself. We got to chat with him for a minute and we asked if he was a believer. He said yes and that he didn't meet many believers at the park. We told him where we were going and what we were doing and he was so excited for us. I wish I could type in a Jamaican accent cause his was so cool.
On our way out of the park the next morning we saw him again and stopped to say goodbye. He sent us off with a blessing "that a lot of souls get saved." Cortney had told us that there are a lot of believers in Jamaica... I hope that can be said of our country again soon. When you hear of foreign missionaries coming here to preach, you know it's bad. It is so good to know that we will be on mission to our country in North Carolina, we get to be a part of changing what Cortney's experience has been here in the States.
After this, we'll drive as far as we can to somewhere in Missouri, crash, and continue on to Kentucky! Keep a lookout for Day 6!
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