There is a video on YouTube of a short speech by the British actor Hugh Laurie called “America is Too Big to Know Itself.” The speech is an ode to the cultural and geographical diversity of America. Even in a Starbucks and McDonald’s world, that diversity still exists. I’ve experienced it first-hand over the past three months as I drove a circuitous route from the Atlantic to the Pacific and then back to North Carolina. I made a conscious effort not to eat at fast food chains, or at least to avoid the national fast food chains I’ve had so many times. This meant some really good meals in places like Billings, Montana and Hood River, Oregon, and some not-so-good meals in some other places that I won’t name here. Overall that effort was worthwhile and if anyone takes a road trip I recommend it—stop just outside of town, do a quick search on the maps app of your choice, and give a local place a shot. If nothing else you’ll get the chance to talk to locals about their home.

There will be more detailed reflections on parts of the journey in the coming weeks in this column. This week I’ll just record a few of the summary figures. I did not count the total mileage of the trip but 9-10k miles in total doesn’t sound crazy given all of the extra driving I did when I was “stationary” in Austin, Denver, or at the national park destinations. I drove through 19 states, including 5 new states for me, and on 19 interstates (excluding any with triple digits). I explored or skirted Rocky Mountain, Glacier, Olympic, North Cascades, Yellowstone, and Theodore Roosevelt National Parks. I didn’t have any insane wildlife encounters by my subjective standards, but I saw plenty of animals, from and owl and bald eagles in Tennessee to bears, big horn sheep, and bison in Montana to marmots and grouse in Washington. I even added a new baseball stadium to my list when I watched the Twins beat the Diamondbacks in Minneapolis.