Badlands and Black Hills
The Badlands and Black Hills are in the western part of South Dakota. This beautiful region consists of the Badlands, with canyons and rugged terrain; and the Black Hills, a mountain range with forests and the famous Mount Rushmore.| Tap on a place to explore it |
Photo: Chaitanya.polumetla, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Essential Destinations
Top destinations include Rapid City and Deadwood.
Rapid City
Rapid City is the largest city in the Badlands and Black Hills region of South Dakota. It is a convenient base for travel on to the Mount Rushmore National Memorial, the Crazy Horse Memorial, the Badlands, and the Black Hills National Forest.
Deadwood
Photo: Robbschultz69, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Deadwood is a town in the Black Hills of South Dakota. It is rivaled only by Tombstone, Arizona as America's most storied town from the wild frontier days.
Sturgis
Photo: J.T (Jason) Thorne, CC BY 2.0.
Sturgis is a city in the Black Hills of South Dakota that is most famous for the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.
Destinations to Discover
Explore places such as Spearfish and Badlands National Park.
Spearfish
Photo: KLOTZ, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Spearfish is in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Although Spearfish is a small community with 14,000 residents, it is the commercial and academic center for several towns in the Black Hills and nearby Wyoming and Montana, attracting more than a million visitors each year with its museums, festivals and natural beauty.
Badlands National Park
Photo: Martin Kraft, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Badlands National Park is a national park in southwestern South Dakota. This park is marked by rugged "badlands" terrain, sharply contrasting with the rolling hills and prairie surrounding it.
Keystone
Keystone is a tiny town in the Black Hills of South Dakota, at the entrance to the popular Mount Rushmore National Memorial. It offers a full range of accommodations, but at the price of a "tourist trap" veneer.
Hot Springs
Hot Springs is a town of about 3,000 people in the Black Hills of western South Dakota, founded as a resort around a historic warm spring. It's a jumping-off point for nearby Wind Cave National Park.
Belle Fourche
Photo: icanchangethisright, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Belle Fourche is a city in the Badlands and Black Hills region of South Dakota. It is the closest settlement to the geographic center of all 50 states of the United States.
Lead
Photo: Wikimedia, Public domain.
Lead is a city in Lawrence County, South Dakota, United States. The population was 2,982 at the 2020 census. Lead is located in western South Dakota, in the Black Hills near the Wyoming state line.
Custer
Photo: Posi66, Public domain.
Custer is a city in the southern Black Hills of South Dakota, the first city founded in the region. The city lines were laid out by the notorious Al Swearengen who was portrayed in the popular HBO series, Deadwood.
Kadoka
Photo: Idawriter, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Kadoka is a city in and the county seat of Jackson County, South Dakota, United States. The population was 543 at the 2020 census. The town occupies about 2.3 square miles.
Wind Cave National Park
Photo: Wikimedia, Public domain.
Wind Cave National Park is a national park near the town of Hot Springs in western South Dakota. The park takes its name from the unique phenomenon of air being either sucked into or blown out of a natural hole in the ground, depending on atmospheric conditions.
Wall
Photo: Konrad Summers, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Wall, South Dakota, "the geographic center of nowhere," is known best to cross-country travellers for its main attraction, Wall Drug. Advertised on gigantic billboards for hundred of miles to the west and east on Interstate 90, the gargantuan drug store has put Wall on the nation's map.
Pine Ridge
Photo: Wikimedia, Public domain.
Pine Ridge is a town in South Dakota and the tribal headquarters of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
Mount Rushmore National Memorial
Photo: ArthurTilton, CC BY-SA 3.0.
Mount Rushmore National Memorial is a United States national memorial in the Black Hills of west South Dakota. This national icon features the monumental faces of four former Presidents – George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln – blasted and carved from the white rock of a mountain.
Jewel Cave National Monument
Photo: Murray Foubister, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Jewel Cave National Monument is in the Black Hills of South Dakota. The cave is the third longest known cave in the world, with over 208 mi of mapped and surveyed passages as of 2020, and more being added each year.
Black Hills National Forest
Photo: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Public domain.
Black Hills National Forest is public land operated by the U.S. Forest Service in the Badlands and Black Hills region of South Dakota, as well as an adjoining part of Northeast Wyoming.
Rosebud
Rosebud is the main town on the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Other towns on the reservation include Mission and St. Francis.Custer State Park
Photo: Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 2.0.
Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota encompasses 71,000 acres of spectacular terrain and an abundance of wildlife. This is not the location of the battle sometimes called "Custer's Last Stand", or more correctly the battle of Little Bighorn.
Minuteman Missile National Historic Site
Photo: Chris Light, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Minuteman Missile National Historic Site is a United States National Historic Site in South Dakota. Here you will find remnants of the Cold War, including an underground launch control center and a missile silo.
Badlands and Black Hills
- Type: region
- Description: region in southwest South Dakota with mountains and notable eroded peaks
- Also known as: “Black Hills and Badlands”
- Location: South Dakota, Great Plains, United States, North America
- View on OpenStreetMap
Latitude of center
44.39° or 44° 23′ 24″ northLongitude of center
-102.51° or 102° 30′ 36″ westWikidata ID
Q14204659
This page is based on Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons, and Wikivoyage.
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Satellite Map
Discover Badlands and Black Hills from above in high-definition satellite imagery.
In Other Languages
From Esperanto to Italian—“Badlands and Black Hills” goes by many names.
- Esperanto: “Mavlando kaj Nigraj Montetoj”
- French: “Badlands and Black Hills”
- Italian: “Badlands e Black Hills”
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Delve into Pierre, Sioux Falls, Aberdeen, and Watertown.
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About Mapcarta. Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license, except for photos, directions, and the map. Description text is based on the Wikivoyage page “Badlands and Black Hills”. Photo: Chaitanya.polumetla, CC BY-SA 3.0.