Shabbos was quite hot but restful. It’s another beautiful day at Toadstool Geologic Park:

I thought it would be fun to fly over the badlands, so we drove just out of the campground and set up:

Unfortunately, I got started too late, so by the time I was ready to take off the winds had really picked up and it was three hours after sunrise, the point at which thermals start to be dangerous, so I decided to not fly.  Since all the gear was out, I taught Trish how to kite the wing:

Meanwhile, the kids were up in the badlands hiking around.  We had GPRS radio contact with them, so they could roam a bit:

Trish kiting in the background:

After we stowed the PPG gear, I took the kids on an interpretive hike in the badlands:

Fossilized bird tracks from the Oligocene Era:

This is a portion of a 3/4 mile trackway of fossilized Oligocene-Era rhino and giant pig tracks, the longest trackway of its kind in North America:

Adjacent to the campground was a replica sod homesteader’s cabin, built in 1984 to replace the original cabin built on this spot in the 1930s:

We drove South and West to Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, where a waterhole preserved the remains of hundreds of early-Miocene-Era mammals:

The visitor center was very well done:

The kids worked through the Junior Ranger program and received their badges, as well as a Junior Ranger patch:

On our way out the park, we hiked a trail that led to a preserved Daemonelix, the fossilized burrow of the Palaeocastor:

Along the way we found a baby Horned Lizard:

The Daemonelix:

Another horned lizard:

The plains go on forever:

We continued South to overnight at the Walmart of Scottsbluff, Nebraska.  See the trip map for details.