Why I don't Feel The Need to Travel Outside The United States
Deborah Colleen Rose
7/13/20265 min read
Every so often someone asks me, "When are you going to Europe?" Or they tell me I simply have to visit Italy, Greece, or New Zealand.
My answer usually surprises them.
"I'm not sure I ever will."
It isn't because I think other countries have nothing to offer. They do. Every nation carries its own history, culture, beauty, and traditions. If someone has the opportunity to see the world, I genuinely hope they enjoy every mile of it.
But for me, I've never felt a pull to leave the United States.
That probably sounds strange in a world where international travel is almost treated like a badge of honor. Social media has made it seem as though your life isn't complete until you've taken a picture in front of the Eiffel Tower, walked the canals of Venice, or watched the sunset over Santorini.
I don't see it that way.
The United States is nearly four million square miles. It stretches from tropical islands to frozen tundra, from deserts that seem to belong on another planet to mountain ranges that disappear into the clouds. We have rain forests in Hawaii, glaciers in Alaska, coral reefs in Florida, towering redwoods in California, rolling hills in Kentucky, the Great Lakes that look like oceans, and coastlines that seem to go on forever.
If you want beaches, we have them.
If you want mountains, we have them.
If you want waterfalls, deserts, caves, canyons, forests, rivers, swamps, islands, volcanoes, or wide-open plains, they're all here.
One weekend you can stand in Arizona and feel as though you're walking across Mars. A few days later you can find yourself among the moss-covered trees of the Pacific Northwest, where everything is green and dripping with life. Head north into Montana or Wyoming and the land feels untamed. Travel into New England during autumn and entire mountainsides become living paintings.
How many countries can offer that kind of variety without ever crossing a border?
Then there are the people.
The United States isn't one culture.
It's hundreds.
The food changes from one region to another. The accents change. The music changes. The architecture changes. Even the pace of life changes. New Orleans doesn't feel anything like Boston. Maine feels nothing like Texas. Appalachia tells different stories than the Pacific Coast. Alaska feels like another world altogether.
Every state has its own personality.
Some places are loud.
Some whisper.
Some wear their history on every street corner.
Others remind you that nature was here long before we were.
People often speak about Europe having centuries of history, and they're right. But America tells a different story. It tells the story of Native peoples whose cultures reach back thousands of years. It tells the story of exploration, revolution, expansion, immigration, innovation, hardship, courage, and reinvention. Every battlefield, ghost town, courthouse, old church, railroad, and forgotten cemetery has a story waiting for someone willing to stop and listen.
I don't think we've explored our own backyard nearly enough.
There are thousands of small towns where the diners still know everyone's name. Hidden museums run by volunteers who know every artifact by heart. Roads that don't appear on travel brochures. Historic hotels with floors that creak because they've welcomed guests for over a hundred years.
Those places interest me as much as any famous landmark overseas.
Perhaps even more.
There's also a practical side to my thinking.
Americans spend billions of dollars each year traveling abroad. Imagine if even a fraction of that money stayed here. Those tourism dollars would support family-owned restaurants, independent hotels, local outfitters, museums, artists, musicians, tour guides, national parks, historic sites, and countless small businesses that depend on visitors. They would circulate through our own communities, helping create jobs and strengthening local economies from Maine to Hawaii and from Alaska to the Florida Keys.
I don't say that because I think people shouldn't travel internationally. Everyone should spend their money where they choose. I simply wonder what would happen if more Americans became tourists in their own country before looking elsewhere. We often search for hidden treasures on another continent while overlooking the treasures in our own backyard.
There is another benefit that may be even more valuable than the economic one.
America is often described as divided. We hear about political divisions, racial divisions, cultural divisions, and regional divisions almost every day. Yet many of us have never spent meaningful time with people who live differently than we do.
It's easy to misunderstand people you've never met.
It's much harder to dislike someone after you've shared a meal with them, listened to their stories, attended one of their local festivals, or walked through the neighborhoods they call home.
Travel has always been one of the greatest teachers. We often assume that lesson only comes from crossing oceans. I think it can happen just as powerfully by crossing state lines.
Spend time on a Navajo reservation. Visit the Mississippi Delta. Walk through Little Havana in Miami. Attend a powwow in Oklahoma. Explore the Amish communities of Pennsylvania. Experience the Cajun culture of Louisiana. Visit the Gullah communities along the South Carolina coast. Listen to gospel in a small Southern church. Attend a rodeo in Texas. Spend time in neighborhoods where generations of immigrants have built communities while preserving the traditions they brought with them.
Each place tells another chapter of the American story.
Understanding doesn't require agreement.
It requires exposure.
The more we understand one another, the more difficult it becomes to reduce people to stereotypes. Curiosity has a way of replacing suspicion. Familiarity has a way of softening prejudice. When we begin to see one another as neighbors instead of categories, barriers that once seemed permanent often begin to weaken.
Travel within America isn't simply about seeing beautiful places.
It's about seeing Americans.
Every one of them has a story worth hearing.
Travel, at least for me, has never been about collecting passport stamps.
It's about discovery.
Sometimes discovery is found standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon. Sometimes it's watching the sunrise over the Smoky Mountains. Sometimes it's sitting in a small café in a town you've never heard of, listening to stories from people whose lives are completely different from your own.
Distance doesn't create meaning.
Attention does.
The older I get, the less interested I am in seeing everything and the more interested I am in seeing something well.
I'd rather spend several days wandering one national park than rush through five countries trying to check famous landmarks off a list. I'd rather drive the back roads than race from airport to airport.
The journey has become more important than the destination.
Perhaps one day I'll travel overseas. If the opportunity presents itself, I certainly wouldn't refuse it.
But I don't feel like I'm missing part of life because I haven't.
Not when I still haven't seen all fifty states.
Not when there are national parks I haven't walked, Civil War battlefields I haven't explored, mountain towns I've never visited, coastal highways I've never driven, or hidden lakes I've never discovered.
One lifetime isn't enough to know America.
And until I can honestly say I've experienced the incredible variety this country offers, I don't feel any urgency to look somewhere else.
Sometimes the greatest adventures aren't waiting across an ocean.
Sometimes they're waiting just beyond the next state line.