Weekend Adventures

This past weekend my husband was racing in the Maah Daah Hey 100 bike race in North Dakota, so I tagged along for the ride.  It was a CRAZY day for a bike race...the temperatures soared upwards to 40 C, and my poor hubby was out there biking 100 miles.  Eventually the organizers had to stop the race due to the extreme temperatures.  Many riders were suffering from heat stroke, and some even had to be taken out of the race via ambulance!  I'm happy that my hubby is alright, even though he was disappointed that he couldn't ride all 100 miles.  There's always next year :)

While he was racing I explored the Theodore Roosevelt National Park (south unit).  It is a beautiful park that features the badlands of North Dakota.  I took a few photos from lookout points along the scenic roadway through the park:

There were many, many herds of buffalo roaming around the park.  I also saw a number of prairie dog towns and even two packs of wild horses!  I wish that I could have stopped the car to take pictures of the horses, but they were in areas where there were no places to pull over from the road. I will just have to remember their beauty in memory!

I stopped at the Peaceful Valley Ranch in the park and went on a horse trail ride.  It was so much fun!  The trail was about 1 1/2 hours long and took us through beautiful scenery in the wilderness of the park.  

My horses's name was Kelvin.  He's the brown and white spotted one third from the left.  He was an awesome horse!

I also went on a short hike; the Coal Vein trail.  The hike was only about 30 minutes long, but I was just about dying from the heat.  I can only imagine what all the cyclists were going through that day!

The badlands of North Dakota are beautiful!  I'm glad I was able to enjoy exploring the park this weekend.  Maybe I can visit again during next year's race!

It was a great weekend, except for running into car troubles on our way home Sunday.  We ended up having to stay an extra night in the US (as all the auto shops were closed), only to find out that it couldn't be fixed there.  We somehow made it home today on battery power and will have our local mechanic look at it this week!