Interested in seeing all 50 states over multiple years, how would you group them together?

16 comments

1. I wouldn’t plan my trips like you’re trying to do. Let it happen naturally while seeing the things you want to see on your vacations. When you start getting close to having them all, knock out what’s left.

   Regarding your trips you have, do Southern California with Nevada, Arizona, Utah, etc. Then again with the PNW and NorCal.

   Remember there are two states that require a trip all on their own in HI and AK. For most Americans those are the toughest to collect when going for all 50.

2. New England, NY to Virginia, the southeast coast, the gulf coast, the deep south, the mid west, the mountain states, the southwest, the northwest and Alaska, the Pacific coast and Hawaii.

3. I wouldn’t string them out along an axis the way you have your Trip 1. If you’re trying to do three each time, I’d do them in a more compact cluster, for example WA/OR/ID.

4. You should devote two weeks to California by itself. You can do all of New England in two weeks.

5. Not sure how enjoyable it would be to hit all 50 states for the sake of doing so if you’ve only been to the US once before. Much of your time would just be driving through the countryside and stopping at rest stops. The US is massive and that’s an understatement.

   Regional trips can be worth it but even then you’d only enjoyably hit a few states in a couple of weeks. The northeast is a reasonable path to start with so flying into Boston, exploring and then renting a car, and driving down the coast through nyc, Philly, dc, etc. That would still be on a really tight schedule and you’d only scratch the surface of all these cities.

6. Will you be driving thru most of these states? I feel like that would change how I answer this. But here’s my take on it, considering cities and popular attractions I’m aware of:

   Trip 1: New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine

   Trip 2: New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware

   Trip 3: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida

   Trip 4: Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas

   Trip 5: Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia

   Trip 6: Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan

   Trip 7: Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota

   Trip 8: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska

   Trip 9: Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma

   Trip 10: Texas (it’s huge, lots to do in 2 weeks)

   Trip 11: New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Utah

   Trip 12: Wyoming, Montana, Idaho

   Trip 13: Nevada, California (also so much to do)

   Trip 14: Oregon, Washington, Alaska

   Trip 15: Hawaii

   Take note that if you’re driving, the distances will be very long. I’d love to breakdown the trip further with specific sites. I feel like that’d give a more realistic and satisfying answer

7. Some local advice: split the new england states into “rural” and “urban”

   So one trip could be from DC to Baltimore to Philly to NJ to NYC to Boston, then another from vermont to upstate new york to chesapeake bay to rural maine

8. I would look at a specific area and think of all you wanna see. Its awesome to check states off a list in and of itself but you can do that while seeing nothing of interest, or you can plan around specific points in different states.

   Here is a couple of road trips I have done so you can get an idea on how to plan a trip.

   I road tripped once from my suburban Minneapolis home to my mom’s suburban Miami home, to go to my cousins wedding. So that trip took us through MN, WI, IL, IN, KY, TN, GA, FL… then on the way back we took a longer but more scenic route that took us through SC, NC, VA, WV and OH.

   One road trip we did involved visiting tons of different areas in Texas alone but we started in MN, then SD, NE, WY, CO, NM, TX, AR, MO, IL, WI and back to MN. In Nebraska, we stopped to see stonehenge and chimney rock. Definitely cool little spots to see that are in an otherwise isolated and empty area. In St. Louis, Missouri… we rode a tram to the top of the Gateway Arch. In Chicago, we explored the city on foot and also drove to Winnetka to see the Home Alone house, which this was after a heavy snowstorm, looked absolutely beautiful.

   In Texas we saw the Alamo, we drove my car on Mustang Island, we saw where Selena used to live, the motel where she was shot and a memorial to her.

   Last road trip I did, we went to visit my brother in Boston and went whale watching for my birthday. That trip took us through MN, WI, IL, IN, OH, PA, NJ, NY, CT, RI, MA… on one day we went to NH, and ME then back to MA. When we left we went back through NY, crossed into Ontario in Canada, back to the US in MI and back home through WI.

   Destinations included NYC, Boston, Provincetown, Portland, Salem, Niagara Falls, Mackinaw City.

   I only have 10 states left but these 3 road trips had added 21 new ones for me at the time. These were my three longest road trips.

9. Could probably make NY, California, Texas, Alaska and Florida all single state trips.

   Maybe a month for California and Alaska if you want to get to all the National Parks.

   Could do:

   * Week 1: Maine, NH, Vermont
   * Week 2: Mass, CT, RI
   * Week 3: Upstate NY
   * Week 4: NYC
   * Week 5: NJ, PA
   * Week 6: MD, Delaware, DC
   * Week 7: Virginia/West Virginia
   * Week8: NC, SC
   * Week 9: Georgia, Northern FL
   * Week 10: Central FL, Southern FL
   * Week 11: AL, MS, LA
   * Week 12: TN, KY
   * Week 13: Ohio, Indiana
   * Week 14: Michigan, Illinois
   * Week 15: Wisconsin, MN
   * Week 16: ND, SD, Nebraska
   * Week 17: Kansas, Oklahoma
   * Week 18: Missouri, Arkansas
   * Week 19: Houston, Dallas, Austin
   * Week 20: San Antonio, West Texas
   * Week 21: NM, Arizona
   * Week 22: NV, Utah
   * Week 23: Colorado
   * Week 24: Wyoming, Montana
   * Week 25: Idaho, Washington
   * Week 26: Oregon, Northern CA
   * Week 27: Bay Area
   * Week 28: Sierra Range National Parks
   * Week 29: Desert National Parks and SoCal
   * Week 30: Hawaii
   * Week 31: Alaska Panhandle
   * Week 32: Anchorage to Fairbanks
   * Week 33: Gates of the Artic and Wrangal St Elias
   * Week 34: Katmai and Lake Clark

10. Trip 1: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island

    Trip 2: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware

    Trip 3: DC, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina

    Trip 4: Georgia, Florida

    Trip 5: Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky

    Trip 6: Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois

    Trip 7: Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa

    Trip 8: Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana

    Trip 9: Texas, Oklahoma

    Trip 10: Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota

    Trip 11: Montana, Wyoming, Colorado

    Trip 12: New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada

    Trip 13: Utah, Idaho, Oregon, Washington

    Trip 14: California

    Trip 15: Hawaii

    Trip 16: Alaska

11. As a foreigner, there are numerous states I’d avoid because there’s not enough there to see.

12. Interesting question. I’ve travelled all 50 states extensively.

    [I drew it out on a map.](https://imgur.com/a/JDE4W62) 12 trips to these areas, plus one to Alaska and one to Hawaii, though IIRC there’s direct air routes between Alaska and Hawaii, so visiting Alaska in the winter and then flying to Hawaii might be interesting. If you have the time you could also combine some of these.

    This map is for landscapes and is not centered around visiting cities.

13. If you had to split new england, I’d say southern (CT, RI, MA) and northern (VT, NH, ME)
    Florida is Florida.

14. You should group Alaska and Hawaii together, because they’re both out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

15. My dad just took two months off of work and started in Michigan, drove through Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Nevada to California. On his way home he went California, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana to Michigan.

    He drove at night and his spouse drove during the day so they didn’t have to stop often. He spent a full week in California and only a day or two in other states.

    I don’t recommend doing so many in one drive, but it’s doable. I wouldn’t even know how to group them unless you have specific cities or locations you wanted to see.

16. You would need like a year to do this and you should dedicate at least a week to any state bigger than Maryland.