Kansas Badlands

A road trip to Little Jerusalem Badlands State Park was the perfect high to the Labor Day weekend. As a Midwesterner we naturally made this 8 hour round trip into a one day road trip.

We thought we were being all cool and taking the "scenic route" but alas, there were not many scenes to be found.

Finally we got to the park (and that last hour of the drive was excruciating!).

As the rule followers we are, we did not go into the forbidden canyon as only guided tours are allowed to do that. We hiked on the trail around the rim, admired the view and saw several of the "official state" this and that.

There were many fluffy bumble bees slowly buzzing from flower to flower:

We enjoyed seeing all the plants and a few creatures, including a grasshopper so large that at first I couldn't even tell what it was:

The sunflowers were bountiful:

Barbed wire poked out of the prairie grass paying homage to this only recently made public land:

We saw the homes of the cliff swallows (or at least that's what I was told, I'm not a birder):

The views were spectacular:

I believe late summer near sunset is the best time to visit Little Jerusalem.

As a reward for not putting my camera away too soon, this little rabbit stopped to pose for quite a bit of time in the middle of the trail:

We would've loved to stay and finish out this sunset but unfortunately the park closes at sunset (or 9pm, not sure if Google was telling the truth) and we didn't want to risk getting trapped inside.