A couple weeks ago, I didn’t expect to have much material for this newsletter.

That’s because, of our six upcoming stops, four would be big cities that we’d visit just long enough to see a game at the local Major League Baseball stadium. As for the other two stops, they included one Ohio state park and Kentucky’s only national park—both of which sounded great, but not oh-wow-I-can’t-wait-to-put-this-in-the-newsletter great.

Basically, I expected this newsletter to say one thing: We went to lots of baseball games.
I had no idea how wrong I would be.

Yes, we went to lots of baseball games over the past couple weeks--five, to be precise--but we also got four surprises.

One of those surprises was downright awful.

Two were pretty spectacular.

And one became a memory we’ll treasure for the rest of our lives.

Here’s a look at the utterly not-dull time we’ve been having lately.

When we left the Smokies a couple weeks ago, we said goodbye to the last national park we’ll see for a while. In the weeks ahead, our travel route will be dictated by something we have no control over: the Major League Baseball schedule.

After all, we’re not just trying to see every national park in the lower 48 on this Big Trip; we’re also trying to see 29 of the 30 MLB stadiums.* We’ve hit seven so far, and we’ve got a slew of games at new stadiums coming up over the next few weeks.

To get to those games, we’ve made our way northeast. We’ve meandered through the Carolinas and the Virginias, and up into Maryland. And as we went, we couldn’t help noticing a distinct shift in our surroundings.

For once, we’re nowhere near a national park—no Yellowstones or Grand Canyons or Yosemites. But we’re absolutely surrounded by national historical parks.

Everything out here seems to harbor a bit of U.S. history. That house over there? Built in 1765. That grassy area? The setting of a major civil war battle. That park bench? George Washington sat on it.
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When we’re not at a baseball game, we’ve been brushing up on our U.S. history—enough so that I feel more ready for the AP test now than I did back in high school. Here’s a look at where we’ve been learning lately.

I made a mistake in our last newsletter, specifically in the Where are we going next? section. Somehow, after looking ahead in the calendar, I listed all our final Florida stops in the newsletter—but omitted every stop after that.

The Floridian humidity must have gotten to my head. It convinced me we were never leaving.

Thankfully, the Sunshine State has loosened its grip on us, and now I’m writing to you from a coffee shop in the town of Cherokee, nestled in the North Carolina mountains. For the first time in months, we have no signal and no RV hookups at our campsite—and I have to say, I’m relishing it. (Jason, not so much. The Masters Tournament happened this weekend, and he was anxious to check the leaderboard every day.)

We enjoyed our time in Florida (mostly), but the weirdest part about our time there? We didn’t see a single mountain for weeks. Everywhere we went, the state unfurled around us either in an endless, flat, grassy expanse or a congested metro area populated by some of the worst drivers we’ve ever seen. (And we’re from California.)

It was unsettling. We’ve lived our entire lives in the shadows of mountains, and I didn’t realize how unmoored I’d feel without them looming on the horizon. It’s good to be back among them now, however brief our stay might be.

Six weeks after leaving Southern California, we can finally say we’ve driven across the country. We’ve made it to the east coast. We’ve seen the Atlantic Ocean. We’re in Florida, the farthest we’ve ever traveled by car.

And… it looks a lot like home.

There are palm trees and strip malls. Cities bleed into each other in an urban sprawl akin to Los Angeles’s. And, most reminiscent of our SoCal roots, we keep running into traffic and bad drivers. If you want to send Jason into a rant, ask him what it’s like to drive in Florida sometime.

That said—Florida also seems quite determined to prove that it’s not Southern California.

Despite its nickname as the Sunshine State, we’ve gotten caught off guard by three violent thunderstorms since entering Florida about a week ago. (Weather forecasts don’t seem to mean much here where rain’s concerned.) The humidity is inescapable. And we’ve already had one campground neighbor who made us feel a little like Phil and Claire Dunphy in season 6, episode 5 of Modern Family. (iykyk.)

But hey, it’s Florida. While we’re here, we want to experience the most Floridian aspects of Florida as possible. That’s what we’ve been trying to do over the last couple weeks.
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Keep reading to see how it’s going.

Over the last two weeks, we entered a new phase of the trip: the southern city phase. We traded our hiking boots for comfortable walking shoes—or Docs in my case, because my formerly sprained ankle needs the support—and we hit the concrete.

I could tell you that we had lots of sightseeing planned. That we intended to explore each city with the same sense of adventure and excitement that we carry into national parks.

But honestly? We came for the food.

Look. Ever since Jason visited Austin a couple years ago and had his first taste of authentic Texas barbecue, he has not shut up about it. So you can imagine why, as he planned this phase of the trip, he oriented a lot of our schedule around eating.

And I can’t complain (anymore). Because now that I’ve tasted authentic Texas barbecue—not to mention New Orleans gumbo and South Carolina fried chicken—I can’t shut up about it either.

But anyway. I’ll try not to turn this newsletter into a southern-cooking menu.

​In our first couple weeks on the road, we’ve wandered across three—yes, three—deserts in the southwest U.S.: the Mojave, the Sonoran, and the Chihuahuan. We couldn’t see their borders as we crossed them, but I think we could feel them. Each desert has its own character, and while the Mojave is familiar to us—it’s our home, after all—the Sonoran and Chihuahuan feel like new friends.

Deserts can appear bleak at first glance, but they hold plenty of surprises. Keep reading to see some of the surprises we found recently.

Our “winter break” at home has come to an end. After three months of stuffing ourselves with Thanksgiving turkey, Christmas tamales, and Super Bowl BBQ, we’re finally back on the road.

We’re so ready—and a bit nervous, too.