Twenty years since the World Trade disaster and I am roaming the United States. I remember the day it happened, such an unbelievable shock, and my daughter in NYC. I look out on a vista today and think how lucky we are not to have to see troops and check points at every road side. We are still free despite the last year of COVID. Think how many people are not.

No one goes to North Dakota, they say. Well they should. The Theodore Roosevelt National Park is one to see. It is not as well advertised as others, but it is a gem in the middle of what one person has called a “dull state.”

Driving from South Dakota to North Dakota is an endless highway of flat prairie land until you get closer to North Dakota. The trees are starting to change, and the golden color of the leaves stand out in contrast to the green of the trees and the dull beige of the prairie land.

This is truly the place where you can sing loudly:

Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam
Where the deer and the antelope play
Where seldom is heard a discouraging word
And the skies are not cloudy all day

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North Dakota is just that. Driving through the park. the buffalo roamed right next to the van and in front of it. Taking pictures of them was challenging because they were usually walking away or grazing. Getting a facial picture was near impossible. It reminded me of when I took the grandkids to Africa and all I seemed to have were “butt pictures.” I kept telling them I was going to make a “Butt Calendar” and I kept my promise, they each got one for Christmas, each month a different African animals butt. Now I have Buffalo butts.

It was pretty exciting to be a few feet away from the obvious leader of the group and to be able to get some pictures worth keeping. It took us a half an hour to go about 100 feet as the buffalo were not going to move for us. The male buffalo was the size of the Subaru in front of us.

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I really wanted to see wild horses and at the end of the day we spotted them up on a ridge. Shap and I climbed another ridge, looking out for rattlesnakes, and cactus or the odd charging buffalo.

I really wish the horses had been in the setting sun as the pictures would have been much more interesting. But I got to see them and that was my wish.

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My friend Andree has “Helen” the parking goddess who guides her to the best parking spots. Even when there appears to be not one spot available, there is always one for her. We have “Nigel” with his Australian accent,  as our trusty road guide. He has taken us over dirt roads so remote I can’t imagine he could find them thru satellite and on Google maps. Thanks to him, we have experienced back roads so narrow you wonder how two cars can pass. But then they are so deserted there is no need to worry.

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Tomorrow on to Montana and Glacier National Park.