30 (D-101) Badlands

30 (D-101) A badlands (also badland) is a kind of arid terrain where softer sedimentary rocks and clay-rich soils have been extensively eroded by wind and water. Many of the peoples who have known this kind of terrain chose the same name: 1) The Lakota Indians called the topography "Makhóšiča", literally "bad land"; 2) French trappers called it "les mauvaises terres à traverser" – "the bad lands to cross"; and 3) the Spanish called it "tierra baldía", "waste land". The term badlands is also very appropriate: badlands have steep slopes, loose dry soil, slick clay, and deep sand. All of these all create problems for people who travel there. Badlands are found in arid regions with infrequent but intense rain-showers, little vegetation, and soft sediments: a recipe for massive erosion.

If you like, you can listen and have a look at The Petrified Forest and The Painted Desert at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28ttbBZCvxg

---Two trivia questions for you: (NOT from the youtube link above)
1)What Scottish writer went to the Petrified Forest in 1880? (Hint: He wrote Treasure Island and A Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde.)
2) What is the name of the 1936 American film in which.....
Gabby's mother was a French war bride who fell in love with Gabby's father when he was a young, handsome, uniformed American serviceman. They married and moved to the remote Petrified Forest......
Jane
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