Theodore Roosevelt National Park United States

Legendary

The only US national park to be named after a single person.

Photo by Rennett Stowe

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Theodore Roosevelt first came to the North Dakota Badlands in 1883 to hunt bison. What he found instead was a landscape so harsh and strange that it rewired how he thought about the natural world. He lost his wife and his mother on the same day the following year, and came back to the Badlands to grieve, ranch, and recover. He later said the man who became president never would have existed without his time here.

The park, established in 1978, spreads across three separate units in western North Dakota, all carved by the Little Missouri River winding through the rugged terrain. The river cuts through colorful layered buttes, badlands formations, and wide open prairie that look like nothing else in the American park system.

The Maah Daah Hey Trail connects all three units of the park, stretching 144 miles through the Badlands. Serious hikers and mountain bikers tackle the full route, but shorter sections are doable for families looking to get off the pavement.

Roosevelt's original Maltese Cross Cabin still stands at the South Unit visitor center, moved from its original site but largely intact.

Watch bison herds cross the road in the South Unit, where traffic stops are common and completely worth it. Prairie dogs pop in and out of their towns along the roadside pullouts. Drive the South Unit scenic loop at dusk when the badlands glow orange and feral horses graze along the ridgelines.