However, hardy explorers who ventured into the Badlands were astonished at the fossils that lie strewn about the barren landscape. One of the world's great fossil sites, it's also famed for its eerie beauty. In far western South Dakota are the Black Hills, forested granite mountains that rise like an island from the Great Plains. At 7,242 feet, Harney Peak is the highest point in North America east of the Rocky Mountains. Life-sized dinosaur statues standing on a hill in Rapid City s Dinosaur Park remind tourists from the East that they have entered dinosaur country.
Peace quickly returns to the meadow at the edge of a lush forest.
It's a warm, sunny day in the Oligocene Epoch, some 30 million years ago. A couple volcanoes are smoking in the Rocky Mountains far to the west. But the plumes are visible only to sharp-eyed eagles and hawks soaring overhead. About fifty years ago, a volcanic eruption had dumped a blanket of ash on the forest, killing most of the trees and animals. But no living animal in the area had even been born yet.