<table> </table> BADLANDS NATIONAL PARK, S.D. | Marcia McMacken stepped off the boardwalk and took a long look at the sweeping scene around her &#8212; bright green meadows in front, craggy tan peaks and deep forbidding canyons behind. She was clearly enamored.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s just so different from the normal kinds of landscapes,&#8221; she said. &#8220;The beautiful formations, the colors. It&#8217;s like my husband says &#8212; you really can see where the ocean was many, many years ago.</p><p>&#8220;We love it,&#8221; said McMacken, who lives on Anna Maria Island, Fla., near St. Petersburg. &#8220;We&#8217;ve been here three or four times.&#8221;</p><p>Imagine that much enthusiasm for what&#8217;s often considered a one- or two-hour diversion for travelers on their way to Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills. The Badlands are best known for a dusty, rocky landscape that&#8217;s so filled with synonymous formations that you may be asking for trouble if you venture too far beyond the parking lot.</p><p>But as western South Dakota emerged from years of drought earlier this year, a new color was added to the palette: green.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve never seen it so green,&#8221; said McMacken, pointing out delicate yellow clover growing tall next to the boardwalk. &#8220;Usually there&#8217;s nothing green out here at all.&#8221;</p><p>As national parks go, it&#8217;s still an unusual place. Pretty rocks aside, you can experience a lot of the 244,000-acre park in a few hours, even if you don&#8217;t get out of the car more than a couple of times.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;re considered a drive-through park rather than a destination park like Yellowstone or Yosemite,&#8221; said Chris Morris, a college student volunteer from Pittsburgh who spent his summer in the park. &#8220;A lot of people just drive through and get out at a few of the overlooks.&#8221;</p><p>Just eight main hiking trails lead from the Badlands Loop Road, which traverses the park&#8217;s primary unit. Five of those are less than a mile long. The longest, the Castle Trail, is 10 miles round trip.</p><p>So why go? Ask Marcia McMacken: &#8220;It&#8217;s like being on another planet.&#8221;</p><p><strong><span class="subhead">Boning up</span></strong></p><p><em>Trail</em> is a generous word in the Badlands. No clearly defined boundaries mark the way through the baked spires and buttes. Looking for the Door Trail, I stepped onto the crumbling brown floor and saw yellow posts rising here and there. They marked what passed for the trail.</p><p>Fortunately, it was a short walk &#8212; three-fourths of a mile out to the Door, an opening in a rock wall, and back. Even a direction-impaired traveler would have trouble getting lost. But what a weird, wonderful world it is out there &#8212; sharp ridges and tall towers created by rising mountains, erosion and an extinct inland sea.</p><p>That sea began disappearing 60 million years ago as the Rockies and the Black Hills began forming.</p><p>&#8220;This seaway was about 75 feet deep and stretched from the Gulf of Mexico to Alaska,&#8221; said Morris, who spent parts of his summer talking to visitors at the park&#8217;s Fossil Exhibit Trail.</p><p>One look at what was left behind is all it takes to envision what was here &#8212; the wide subtle stripes of red and brown suggest water. Differences in texture along the rock walls also point to great changes over time.</p><p>Bighorn sheep, pronghorn, buffalo, swift-footed ferrets and other animals now wander what seems like an inhospitable land. But they pale to some of the creatures of the past. Mososaurs &#8212; like a Komodo dragon but maybe 25 feet long &#8212; left their bones here 68 million to 75 million years ago. So did the titanothere, an ancient rhinoceros; the doglike hesperocyon; archaeotherium, a large, piglike animal; and mesohippus, a three-toed &#8220;middle horse.&#8221;