June 21 - Medora, North Dakota

Our first priority was to walk the Volksmarch in Medora and after breakfast we drove into town with a short stop at the National Park Visitor Center, which had a small museum section on Theodore Roosevelt. That man was really larger than life. When ranching in the badlands, three thieves stole the boat he had stored on the Little Missouri River in March when the winter was just ending. He and two men quickly built a crude plank boat and followed the thieves downstream through ice floes for three days until they caught up and captured them. Then Roosevelt's ranch hands continued with the boats downriver to Mandan while he single handedly marched the three thieves 45 miles across country to the sheriff Dickinson.

Another time when he was running for President with the Bull Moose Party, he was shot in the chest by a would be assassin but insisted on continuing on and finishing the speech before he would submit to medical attention. They had his undershirt with the bullet hole displayed in the museum, and the hole was a little to the left and just below his heart. Depending on the angle of entry, I judged that it would have hit his lung and was just astonished that he could stand up and give a speech after that. Obviously, he was one tough cookie. To me, these events are more indicative of the character of the man than the charge up San Juan hill that made him a hero and lead to his election as Governor of New York.

Part of the Roosevelt museum was his old Maltese Cross ranch house from his first ranch in the area before he bought the Elkhorn ranch. The ranch house had been relocated just outside the Visitor Center and well worth a look if you go into the park. The furniture included Roosevelt's writing desk where he wrote at least one of his many books and the rocking chair where he used to sit and discuss politics and ranching with visitors. The Ranger said that Roosevelt had a photographic memory and read two to three books per day, which I find hard to credit (or maybe I'm just envious!). But that would surely make him one of the most widely read Presidents we have ever had and, not coincidentally, make him ferociously difficult to debate with. The comparison with our current President who apparently does not even read newspapers and has to get his information preprocessed through his aides could not have been more stark. TR was also by all accounts a great orator whereas this President has trouble delivering a coherent speech. TR was undeniably brave and a war hero while this President went AWOL from even his token military service in the National Guard. TR fought for conservation of the wilderness while this President wants to drill oil wells in the wilderness. I could go on and on, but you get the idea. I'd vote for TR in a heartbeat, but I guess the Republicans just don't make Presidents like they used to.

After that interesting interlude, we left the Visitors Center and drove to the Badlands Hotel in Medora to sign up for our walk. The route for the walk consisted of three segments and some of the most spectacular scenery I have ever seen. The first segment led us out along a hiker-biker across the Little Missouri River up to the junction with I-94, at which point we turned around and came back to Medora. The Little Missouri also passed by our campsite in the Cottonwoods campground, but it appeared to have a lot more water on this stretch and I was puzzled by that.

The second segment was in past the historic De Mores hunting lodge cum chateau and up a hill to where the Medora Musical is staged on an outdoor arena. We decided to stop in and see the 1880s hunting lodge that is currently preserved and shown by members of the Historic Society. The Marquis De Mores was a rich French aristocrat who bought a large section of land in the area and tried an innovative scheme to slaughter cattle in Medora and send the beef back east by refrigerated railroad cars. That scheme, like his earlier stock speculation and attempt to corner the stagecoach traffic down to the gold fields, failed financially and he packed up his wife and children and moved out shortly thereafter, but not before having established the town and naming it after his wife, Medora. From the U.S. he went to India to hunt tigers, failed to convince the French government to build a railroad in Indochina, and finally was shot by his own guides when he was trying to create some type of alliance with Muslims in the Sahara Desert (!). If you write something like that sequence of events in a novel, it would probably be rejected as too fantastic. What a life!

The De Mores hunting lodge was beautifully preserved and had many original pieces from the time of the Marquis. I was amused that the entire upper story of the 24-room house was devoted to servants' quarters, but they certainly had a large number of them. The rooms of the Marquis and Marquise were, of course, quite a bit fancier than the servants' quarters, but I'm sure it was nothing like the palace they owned back in Cannes, France. Predictably, hunting trophies adorned the walls and many of the old photographs were of the two on hunting expeditions and so forth.

On our way back out we passed something that looked like an old fee collection booth beside the road, but something about the construction made me curious and I poked my head in to take a look. It turned out that the booth was constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps around 1935, and it contained a small but succinct photographic exhibit on the history of the CCC. The CCC museum at Highland Hammock State Park in Florida was bigger and had actual CCC artifacts (see Wanderung 1), but I thought this small memorial was also quite informative and appropriate to commemorate the contribution of the CCC to America in the 1930s. Hurrah for the CCC boys and the modern day volunteers who have followed in their footsteps to help preserve and protect the history and natural wonders of America!

After the CCC museum we returned to the official Volksmarch route that lead past the De Mores hunting lodge up a rather steep hill to an amphitheater where the Medora Musical is staged. This show is supposed to be quite good, but we just didn't have enough energy at 8 p.m. to drive out and catch a performance either of the evenings we were at the park. The amphitheater is carved into the side of the hill and has quite an elaborate set of faux western buildings constructed on the stage. It looked rather intriguing but of course nothing was happening and no one was around in the morning.

As we turned around to head back down the hill, we were suddenly caught in a spurt of ice-cold rain and gusty winds. We did not, of course, have our rain gear along and were quickly chilled to the bone. I was amazed at how quickly that happened, and I would advise anyone taking walks in the mountain area to be sure to take protective layers even if it looks warm and sunny when you start out, because a sudden change of conditions leading to hypothermia is clearly a danger. While you're at it, you might want to make certain that at least one of those layers is waterproof!

But we were lucky (this comes under the heading of "dumb luck") and the storm cleared off just about the time I started shivering. After that it warmed up rather quickly so that by the time we walked the stretch into Medora proper we had almost dried out. After a stop at the TR National Park Visitor Center to stamp our start card, we completed the last segment of the walk that was basically a triangular loop through the town of Medora. All in all, we felt this walk offered fantastic vistas of the badlands and several cultural offerings. There were at least three museums on the walk route: the De Mores hunting lodge, the Theodore Roosevelt museum area of the Visitors Center, and a museum in town that we did not visit. They are also apparently building a "Cowboy Hall of Fame" in town, but that is scheduled for completion in the future.

While we meandered through Medora we also patronized the "Western Edge" book, art, and music store in the middle of town, where we found quite a selection of Western poetry. From the surprisingly extensive collection I picked three volumes. Being a tourist area, Medora naturally has the typical complement of tourist oriented gift shops, restaurants, and so forth, but those were located mostly on the commercial strip along the main highway. We availed ourselves of the simple fare at the eponymously named "Lunch and Munch" restaurant, a very basic eatery featuring 1950s style Formica tables and a decent menu at a decent price, but fancier places with more ambience like the "Iron House Restaurant" were in the same area.

I asked the ticket agent at the De Mores museum about places to have the small hole in my windshield repaired and was informed that the Atlas company in Beach, ND, about 25 miles west of Medora specialized in windshield repair, so after lunch we drove over there. Randy, the proprietor, was fortunately in the shop when we arrived and even more fortunately he could fix the hole for $50 with a lifetime guarantee against cracking. We turned the truck over to Randy for an hour, during which time we celebrated by having a caramel pecan parfait at the local Dairy Queen and also stopped off to buy some groceries. On our walk back, we passed the Golden County Veterans Memorial, where the names of the fallen veterans from all wars were listed. We were impressed by the number of people from this one county that had died in the wars of the last century.

The truck was ready on schedule we returned to the campground in time for a light supper before joining a Ranger walk up the hill across from the campground. This Ranger was a naturalist, apparently, and could give the name and uses of every plant beside the trail. A surprising number of them turned out to be edible, which was good news except that you aren't allowed to pick anything but berries inside a national park. Still, it was useful knowledge and we enjoyed the walk while watching the sun set over the hills west of our campground.

Finishing up the evening with crocheting (Monika) and writing our journal (Bob) took us until it was dark and time to read the next couple of chapters of the adventures of the Emerson family in the Lost Oasis. Reading installments the way we do is somewhat like watching a daily soap opera on TV, I guess, and it is certainly the case that we care as much about the fictional Emerson family as other folks care about soap opera stars. However, we really couldn't take it too seriously and thus it was a great way to relax and get ready to sleep.