One of the many joys of travel - and there are a lot of - is that there is so much room for so many opinions. It's a very big world after all, which no lifetime of adventures can ever fully cover, and everyone's experiences will likely vary. One woman's week at a luxury resort is another woman's tedious self-indulgence; One person's road trip through a majestic landscape is the waste of another's perfect opportunity to lie on a beach. And, to quote rapper Macklemore Thrift shophis 2012 ode to second-hand bargain hunting, "one man's junk, that's another man's come-up" (that's "honey", if you don't parlez hip-hop jargon).
So the headline "I've been to all fifty US states - and I wish I hadn't bothered with it" was always going to elicit a range of responses. And that happened. As it stands, writer James Wong's unimpressed account of the two years he spent exploring the US as a whole, published here on January 25, has attracted more than 1,300 of your comments - the majority of them were surprised that a journey of such detail, through so many glorious places, could lead to such a negative view. But there are also words of agreement. Again, it's a very big world and everyone's experiences will likely vary. The US is a very big country in the same sense - and no two trips through it will be viewed through the same lens.
For me, the US is a travel obsession that has played out in a series of trips over the past 25 years - and will (I hope) continue for just as long. So far I have visited 37 of the 50 states and in all of them I have found something to admire. Not just in New York, where on my last visit I finally made it to the creaky boardwalk, cotton candy and movie references of Coney Island. Not just in California, where I hiked wild trails in Yosemite National Park, drank pinot noir in the Sonoma Valley, visited the tech campuses of San Jose, crossed the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, ate tacos in the Chicano Neighborhoods of San Diego. And not just in other leading lights either, although I have already seen and enjoyed the following: Miami and its beach bars in the new heat of April; New Orleans amid Mardi Gras mania; the Grand Canyon on a snowy day in January, the walls painted white and pink; New England in "autumn," an entire regional tree line turning orange along the roads of New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont.
The story continues
I mention Macklemore in the introduction to this piece, not because Thrift shop is a great song (although it is), but because a man whose real name is Benjamin Haggerty is from Seattle. And I love Seattle. The largest dot on the map of Washington State was my favorite American city, long before I moved there. My interest in it was first sparked by the outsider anthems of Kurt Cobain and Nirvana (well, as 'outsider' as any anthem can be when your second album sells 30 million copies). From a teenage bedroom on the outskirts of Birmingham, I was fascinated by the idea of this metropolis on the far northwestern edge of America; an artistic enclave where such bands could thrive. The four times I visited Seattle after that only confirmed and nourished my love for it - the bars, the coffee culture, the museums, the galleries, the restaurants.
It has also enthralled me with the things I wouldn't have appreciated as a 15-year-old. Especially the incomparable scenery on your doorstep: the dense foliage of Olympic National Park, where Mount Olympus (a mighty cliff worthy of its borrowed name) is shrouded in rainforest; the beaches along the west coast - Ruby Beach, Rialto Beach, Second Beach - where the Pacific Ocean kissing the golden Californian coast 1,000 miles to the south presents a much darker and more dramatic picture, waves crashing relentlessly, fallen cedar logs strewn about it gray sand.
I could write about Seattle endlessly. Maybe I'll eventually get to a point where I do. But the city is not a one-time obsession. It's just the most effusive expression of my admiration - and yes, I really think that's the right word - for the US as a destination.
Seattle may be my American lover, but it's not a strictly monogamous relationship. I'm in the middle of a lifelong love affair with the entire American map, in all its wonder.
For me, the real joy of America is the surprising encounters - or at least the deeper parts that aren't on the Greatest Hits album. To name a few at random: Door Peninsula, just above Green Bay, where a needle of land juts out into the depths of Lake Michigan, while orchards move in the wind; Roswell, amid the otherwise anonymous dust of southeastern New Mexico, where (some of) America's desperate need to clutch at conspiracy straws has every storefront adorned with images of little green men; Black Canyon of the Gunnison, an epic scar in the Colorado soil, neither as long nor as famous as its near-namesake from Arizona, but still quite magnificent; Cincinnati, a fantastic city on the border between Ohio and Kentucky, where beer and bourbon are competing religions; the Outer Banks of North Carolina, where the Wright brothers first flew on the Atlantic wind, and Roanoke - the first permanent English settlement in the 'New World' - flickered and died (in still mysterious circumstances).
Much of this, as you may have noticed, goes against James Wong's views. But who am I to disagree with him - someone (to quote him directly) "queer and Asian" whose experience with certain parts of the US will be starkly different from mine, a heterosexual white man whose unspoken privilege is practically is stamped in my passport. There are also things we agree on. There are plenty of things I don't like about America - its religious and racial intolerance, its vast social inequality, its divisive and divisive politics - and yes, it can be very expensive at times (although the underperformance of the British pound since 2016 don't do that). exactly help).
But traveling through and around it has become a devotion I happily return to again and again. And I will. I still have 13 states to see (and a lot to explore in the 37 I've already visited). I will enter them all, sooner or later.
Where now? Kansas perhaps - the current home of Taylor Swift's personal affections, as well as America's newest sports giant (Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes), and a city that, if you know the map, means you can visit two states in one go (Missouri, as well as Kansas). But wherever I end up, for better or for worse, it will be a new chapter in a story I can't stop reading. One man's waste is another man's journey of a lifetime.
10 Specific American Dreams, According to Chris Leadbeater
I have enjoyed a quarter of a century of traveling to the US. These are random highlights...
Florida
Watching the sunset on Chokoloskee Bay, just outside Everglades City.
Maine
Eating a lobster roll at Stonington Harbor on tiny Deer Isle.
Arizona and Utah
Walking in Monument Valley on a January morning, frost on the desert floor.
Michigan
We drive over the Mackinac Bridge, Lake Michigan on one side and Lake Huron on the other.
Oregon
Browse at Powell's City Of Books, the world's largest independent bookstore, in Portland.
Hawaii
Hiking the Napali Coast on Kauai, real life Jurassic Park (minus the dinosaurs).
California
Eating an Ambrosia Burger at Nepenthe, a pit stop along Highway 1 near Big Sur.
Texas
Jogging along Galveston's windswept waterfront, the island version of the Texas coast.
Pennsylvania
A tour of Fallingwater, undoubtedly Frank Lloyd Wright's most iconic creation.
Tennessee
Ride roller coasters at Dollywood, Dolly Parton's remarkable theme park in Pigeon Forge.