"America the Beautiful: My Home" United States of America by Stephen-KarenConn

United States of America Travel Guide: 282,154 reviews and 645,494 photos

I love the United States of America. I love her for one simple reason; America is my home. I was born and reared here, as were my parents, my grand parents, and several generations before.

As is true with the vast majority of people who call this American melting pot home, my ancestors came from many places: Ireland, Germany, Spain, France, England and perhaps other countries unknown. And at least some of my forebears were native Cherokee Indians. I think of myself as an All-American hybrid.

After being on VT for more than two years now, I have decided to build a general set of pages about this great land. My decision was inspired, at least in part, by a chance meeting with a businessman from Malaysia who happened to sit beside me on a flight between Honolulu and Hong Kong. He was returning home from six weeks in America and I asked him, "How much of our country did you see?"

"Oh," he replied with a confident air, "I saw all of it!"

That was amazing. I have lived in the United States not for 6 weeks but for 60 years, have traveled much, and do not consider that I have seen nearly all of this vast and varied land. I questioned the Malaysian brother, "All of it? Exactly what do you consider all of America to be?"

"I spent a week each in New York, Miami, Chicago, Las Vegas, San Francisco and Seattle," he smiled. From coast-to- coast, from top-to-bottom and in the middle - I saw all of America."

I was stunned. In my opinion the six cities he had visited are an extremely limited introduction to this great country, especially if one stays in a downtown hotel and doesn't venture outside the city center, as he admitted he had done. Actually what he had experiencied is a limited urban America which is almost as foreign to many who live in this country as are London, Moscow or Hong Kong.

I wish every visitor to America could see not only our great cities, but our mid-sized cities as well, and also our small towns, rural villages, countryside, national and state parks, and untamed wilderness areas.

To show all that on this one set of pages would be impossible of course. But I have determined to at least give a small representative sample here.

I feel especially fortunate to have personally visited each of our 50 states, most of them several times. Unfortunately, I have not always taken good photos or kept the best records, so it's going to take some digging to get the material together. Here's my plan:

Must See Tips: A profile of one key city in each state. This may or may not be the state capitol.

General Tips: A page centered around a general symbol of each state. This may be a natural or historical landmark, or some other thing or place which represents the state.

Off the Beaten Path: A natural outdoor feature from each state, be it a mountain, waterfall, seashore, park or whatever.

Restaurants; Shopping; Accomodations: An overview of many of the franchise or chain establishments which may be found throughout the entire nation, or at least over a wide region of it.

These will be my pages, and they will no doubt reflect my own preceptions, prejudices, preferences. As is my style, I will build these in a hop-scotch fashion, here a little - there a little. However, I will try to keep each section in alphabetical order as much as possible.

I'll be working at this for a long time. You're invited to come back occasionally and check on my progress. Your comments or suggestions are always welcomed.

States I Have Visited in the United States

50 of 50 States Visited

In June, 1994, I entered New Hampshire and Maine for the first time, completing my lifelong desire to visit each of the 50 United States. But there is still so much of this great country I have not yet seen. Now I am in process of visiting each of the 3,141 counties, or their equivilents, which comprise those states. To date I have visited more than 87% of them. To see a map of the counties I have visited click on this link:

J. Stephen Conn Counties Visited Map

Pros and Cons

Pros:Some of the BEST people in the world live here!
Cons:Some of the WORST people in the world live here!
In a nutshell:Everyone Is Welcome in America!!!

Intro Updated May 29, 2008
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Reviews (79)

Pizza Hut, Kosciusko, Mississippi - United States of America

Decent Pizza Fast Restaurants (13)

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My Favorite for Down Home Cooking - United States of America

My Favorite for Down Home Cooking Restaurants (13)

coming... You can't get a bad meal at Cracker Barrel. I especially enjoy the vegetable plates, or the turkey with... more travel advice

Wal-Mart, Borger, Texas - United States of America

Always Low Prices Shopping (1)

Wal-Mart is the largest retail chain in the United States, and the the entire world for that matter. Wal-Mart, with... more travel advice

Motel 6, Wichita, Kansas - United States of America

Least Expensive of the Big Chain Motels Hotels (3)

Whenever I am on a road trip and have the option to stay at a Motel 6, I usually take it. Although the facilities are... more travel advice

Things to Do (19)
See All Nebraska, Omaha
Off The Beaten Path (40)
See All Iowa: Field of Dreams

Transportation (1)
Train Travel in America
Favorites (2)
See All Our Flag

Comments (31)

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hunterV Jan 26, 2013 at 7:40 AM

Hi, Stephen and Karen! I feel I have revisited the US, although I have seen just a small part of it when I was there...
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eriksson977 Sep 25, 2009 at 8:18 AM

Hello Stephen, Outstanding pages. Thanks for the virtual tour. Tomas Eriksson :)
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BROOKS Apr 20, 2008 at 4:54 PM

Very interesting about the 9000 year old cave in Alabama of all places. Hope you're well.
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volopolo Jan 28, 2008 at 6:36 PM

Lot of information here!
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slothtraveller Aug 13, 2007 at 4:30 AM

Great pages on the USA. I hope to get the opportunity to see some of the great landscapes there one day. Colorado looks particularly beautiful. Congrats on visiting all 50 states- what an achievement!
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freddie18 Jan 23, 2007 at 2:48 PM

I especially like your Off the Beaten Path of the U.S.A. It is a wonderful page with all these amazing sceneries. I have to visit some - like the Tahquemanon Falls in Michigan. Regards from Freddie
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AKtravelers Dec 25, 2006 at 1:14 AM

A great page for a great country. I really like your highlighting of Ft. McHenry, one of our favorite haunts while in Maryland.
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deecat Nov 24, 2006 at 11:55 AM

Fast food updates were good, even though I'm not a fan of them. Your extensive travel in the USA, especially our parks, is utterly amazing, & your writing skills are "top notch". Can't imagine anything better than what I've just read and seen.
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Gammy1968 Jul 24, 2006 at 5:09 AM

As a kid I have read the book "Misty" which was about the horses on Assateague... I loved it! Thanks for this great tip, it put this place back into my memory. Greetings from Germany Claudia
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toonsarah Jul 8, 2006 at 7:25 AM

Fascinating tips and wonderful photos. Loved reading about and remembering some places I've already visited, and discovering how many more I now want to see!