Theodore Roosevelt NP Camping

Medora, ND  High 50  Low 42

Thursday called for a change in plans and we left Makoshika headed for Medora, ND and Theodore Roosevelt National Park. At this time of year there is almost nothing open in Medora. They really roll up the sidewalks for the winter around here.

It was only an hour’s drive from Glendive and we got there early enough to find a camping spot in Cottonwood Campground in the park. $7 a night with our America the Beautiful Pass.

Can you see that little white camper? That’s us.

Wish I could say I loved this campground but I can’t. I can say that I’m really glad we had a small rig to get in there. There are a couple of nice sites near the front of the pull thru area but the rest were really tight turns to get into them with low branches on the trees. Jan probably could have gotten through there but I’m sure most of the bigger rigs come out really scratched up. We gave up on the pull thrus and went to the back in area. These are very small back ins. Good for tent campers, Class B, small travel trailers like ours, and even some car campers.

Thank goodness Jim is so good at backing because he got us into our site without any problems other than blocking the road for a few minutes.

Also, the road up to the campground is terrible. It’s the main road into the park and you would think it would be in better shape. The campground is 6 miles back into the park from the entrance and everything in the rig got shaken up including us.

HOWEVER, one of the coolest things happened. A bison wandered right through the campground just a site down from us. Jim had taken Scooter out to hunt and all of a sudden he’s yelling at me to grab the camera and get out there.

This is what we saw. Can you see him through the trees?

This is him coming out of the trees.

Wandering across the road and out into the field behind us.

That was exciting. We also had wild turkeys wandering through our campsite.

Then the wind started to howl, the rain moved in, and it got cold. In fact, on Friday we had 55 mph wind gusts. But a little something like wind and rain can’t stop us. Join us next time for our drive around the loop in the South Unit of the park.