My Travels

Pre-2014

Anything I visited before 2014 is in red on the county map above. 

The first travel experience I remember was my family's first move. In the summer of 2006, we moved from the Washington DC are to the Dallas area, and we took a road trip to do so. We took a longer route than optimal to visit my grandparents in South Carolina, which meant we drove through Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. 

Before 2014, we traveled to see family in New Mexico, Indiana, and Michigan and took the typical family trip to Disney World in Orlando, FL. We also decided to visit a number of state parks across Texas, visiting more than 80 in the span of a year, to better learn the state we were growing up in.

2014

Anything I first visited in 2014 is colored in the darker orange on the county map. 

In 2014, my mother had a business trip to the Boston area planned for the week after school would end. We decided to all go up as a family and travel through the North East. We visited Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Maryland in the span of one week. The highlight of the trip, though, was my first time traveling abroad, as we also spent one night in Montreal, Quebec in Canada. 

Later in the year, I went to Colorado on a summer camp and we visited Four Corners National Monument while visiting family in New Mexico. 

2015

Anything I first visited in 2015 is colored in the lighter orange on the map. 

In 2015, I took a spring break trip with my father and grandfather to Anaheim, CA (to meet up with my grandfather's business trip), Las Vegas, NV (to watch the Mountain West Conference basketball tournament), and Hoover Dam.

I then took a school trip to Arkansas in April and went to  West Virginia on a Boy Scout trip. I then met back up with the rest of my family in Washington DC, where we took a road trip to New York and back through Indiana to visit family. 

Finally, in November, we went to visit family in South Carolina, but this time we took Interstate 10 instead of Interstate 20. 

2016

2016 is marked in yellow. 

In the spring, my dad and I took a one night trip to Eastern Oklahoma for a training hike in preparation for Philmont that summer. 

In June, we took off on the longest trip of my life, driving from Dallas to Kansas City, MO. We progressed through horrible weather to the old Rosenblatt Stadium in Omaha, NE and to Sioux Falls, SD. We saw Mount Rushmore and Old Faithful as we worked our way to Seattle, WA and to my second international jaunt to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. We then hopped back down to Portland, OR, Hayward Field in Eugene, and the Redwoods in California. We drove into Reno, NV for my mom to visit her 50th state on her birthday. We continued through Salt Lake City, UT where we visited the East High School from High School Musical and on to Denver, CO. We finished by visiting the oldest geocache in the world in Mingo, KS and drove through Wichita, KS, Oklahoma City, OK and North Texas on the fourth of July, watching firework displays along the way. The trip left my sisters and me with four states left to visit, my dad with three, and my mom with none.

Later that summer, my dad and I hiked roughly 80 miles through the mountains of New Mexico at Philmont, and then we visited family in South Carolina for thanksgiving.

2017

2017 is marked in lime green.

We drove to Galveston, TX and through College Station to see the Texas A and M campus, driving through miscellaneous counties along the way. In May, we took a trip to Asheville, NC for a geocaching event and toured Biltmore when we were there. In late July, I went on a camp to West Texas, running through parks in Abilene, on sand dunes in Monahans, and down highways in Balmorhea. Finally, in December, we ended the year with a trip to San Diego for New Years, fulfilling a bucket list item for my mother.

2018

2018 is marked in dark green.

The day school ended in late May, we flew to Cincinnati, OH for a geocaching event. From there, we drove to Muncie and West Lafayette, Indiana for college visits, to Chicago, IL, and finally a quick spurt into Wisconsin just to say we had visited that state and knocking another one off the list. Around a month later, in late June, we went to Tucson, Arizona for my mom's business and took a day trip to Phoenix while we were there for yet another college visit.

Later that year, in early November, I took my first "road trip" alone, driving the three and a half hours to Austin, TX to watch the state cross country meet. 

2019

2019 is marked in teal.

I did not have many long travels in 2019. We visited Tampa and Orlando, Florida for spring break and went to Universal while we were there. Then, in the summer, my dad and I drove into Oklahoma and drove through a few counties we had never visited just to be able to mark those spots on our maps. I took my longest trip alone, driving to Houston and back for a race, flew to Atlanta for thanksgiving and drove back with family, and in late December, my parents and I took a day to drive through the counties in East Texas we had never been to.

2020

2020 is marked in light blue

Of course, with the pandemic, 2020 didn't allow for many travel opportunities. For spring break my family and I drove to Jemez Springs, New Mexico and stayed there for 3 weeks during the start of the coronavirus pandemic, and again in June. In August, I, along with my mother, took my sister to Purdue University and helped her move in, which allowed me to visit a new string of counties between Arkansas and Missouri. Otherwise, there wasn't much travel to speak of.

2021

2021 is marked in dark blue

In late January, 2021, my dad and I took a trip to the Waco, TX area, where we were able to visit one new county, and grab a lot of geocaches across several new counties. Then, in mid-March, my parents and I took a trip to Abilene, TX for a geocaching event, where we visited 3 new counties and grabbed geocaches in seven new counties. In early May, my mom and I took a trip to north-west Kansas (Colby, specifically) for a geocaching event. 

In late May, our family went out to the mountain home in Jemez Springs, New Mexico again. During this trip, my dad and I took a day to visit the oldest geocache in Colorado, passing through nine new counties along the way. 

In July, my parents and I took a trip to work on a geocaching goal: Find one geocache in each of the 254 counties in Texas. We needed to go out to New Mexico for some family business, and we decided to take advantage of that. My dad and I spent three days finding geocaches in every county between I-40 and I-20 in Texas, and then after a week in New Mexico, my mom joined as we took a week to visit an abundance of counties leaving us with four counties in New Mexico and nine in Texas. Before the trip, I had found geocaches in 114 counties in Texas. At the end, I had found geocaches in 245 of them. As for New Mexico, I had found geocaches in 14 counties, and I have now found geocaches in 29/33 counties there.

This large trip in July was also my first and second time to visit Mexico. We took an hour to spend some time across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas to Piedras Negras, Mexico, and the next day we went only a few feet across the border on the Falcon Dam in Starr County, TX.

In August, I rode along to take my sister to West Lafayette, Indiana for her second year at Purdue University. We didn't cover any new ground, but we made the trip, so it goes on the list.

On Labor Day Weekend, my parents and I drove to the Panhandle of Texas to finish our Texas County Challenges. We visited and found geocaches in the last 9 Texas counties that we needed, and then visited another 5 counties in Oklahoma on the way home.

In December, I went to Indiana to help my sister drive home, and visited a number of counties in southeast Indiana while she was finishing school. 

2022

2022 is marked in purple

On a whim, I took a day in February to visit five new counties in southwestern Oklahoma, near Lawton, just to add them to my map.

My first real trip of 2022 was a three-day, long-weekend trip to Conroe, Texas for the 20th Annual Texas Challenge Geocaching Festival. It was a short trip, and there isn't much to say about it, but it was enjoyable.

In June, my family drove to Indiana for a funeral. I visited two new counties, but it wasn't much of a goal-based trip for obvious reasons.

In July, my parents and I went to Memphis, Tennessee for a geocaching event. I visited eight new counties on the way there (1 in OK and 7 in AR), 2 new counties in Mississippi while there, and 13 new counties on the way home (12 in AR, 1 in OK). 

In August, I drove with my family to Indiana yet again to help drop my sisters at college. In the time between drop off days, I visited 8 new counties in Indiana, and then my mom and I drove back home over five days. We stopped in Green Bay, the Twin Cities, Sioux Falls, and Kansas City along the way, visiting my 48th state with a stop in Fargo, North Dakota (just Alaska and Hawaii left), and visiting 74 new counties along the way (2 IL, 19 WI, 17 MN, 2 ND, 7 SD, 14 IA, 5 MO, 8 KS). We visited Lambeau Field, the highest point in Iowa, and 3 D1 schools (Minnesota, North Dakota State, & Iowa State), and got a flat tire along the way.

2023

On the county map, 2023 is marked in pink

In March of 2023, I had an incredible 2 weeks, adding 20 new counties to my map (9 OK, 1 AR, 1 MO, 9 IL) before spending 4 days in London, England with a couple of friends. This was my first real international trip, after having spent a total of about 36 hours across the border between 2 trips to Canada and 2 jumps into Mexico. We didn't leave the city of London, but we did as many things as we could while there, including standing in both hemispheres at once and attending a Premier League game between West Ham and Aston Villa. Afterwards, my parents and I took a weekend trip to Longview, Texas for the 21st Annual Texas Challenge Geocaching Festival - a now annual trip for us.

In April and May, I was able to spend two-and-a-half weeks in Europe, stopping in eight new countries, including Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, and France. I also re-visited the United Kingdom, where I was able to take the train to the coast in Brighton and watch a fourth tier EFL game between AFC Wimbledon and Tranmere Rovers. I found the oldest geocache in five countries (Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium), and enjoyed use of the unlimited trains offered by the Eurail pass. It was nice to not need to drive for a few weeks. 

A few days after returning to the United States, I drove from West Lafayette, Indiana to the gulf coast of Alabama to help my sister move in to her new job location, picking up a few new counties along the way there and back home (8 KY, 5 TN, 7 AL, 7 MS). Nothing was out of the way, but it was a section of interstate that I had not yet driven on. 

At the beginning of July, I took a trip with my parents to visit each of my sisters, driving from North Texas to South Alabama, then to Washington DC, and back. I picked up 50 new counties (2 LA, 2 MS, 7 GA, 6 SC, 15 NC, 11 VA, 5 MD, 2 DE) and finished my second state of visiting every county, with all 3 in Delaware. I have now been to every county in the states with the most and fewest counties (254 in TX and 3 in DE). We drove north on I-85, taking the entire length of the highway, which was a road I had never taken north of Atlanta. We stopped by Auburn, Clemson, Duke and UNC, and the state capitol buildings of Maryland and Delaware, and a return visit to the National Mall in Washington DC.