From Sea to Shining Sea: 5 Journeys for America’s 250th
In 2026, the United States is celebrating its 250th anniversary, and, like any milestone birthday, it invites a moment to reflect. As a travel writer, I’ve consistently discovered that the government is not necessarily a reflection of its citizens—that, on a human level, people tend to be fundamentally good. In the words of Aldous Huxley, “To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries.” And, on the occasion of America 250, why not apply that generous approach at home, as well as abroad?
I’ve traveled to all 50 states and, in the maelstrom of today’s climate, it’s easy to forget what makes America great: the unique microcultures from the Deep South to the Pacific Northwest, our vast and unspoiled National Parks, the golden beaches and rugged cliffs along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. And, if you really want to experience the purple mountains majesty of the Rockies or the amber waves of grain in the Heartland, the best method is to take off on the open road. As a seasoned road warrior, I’m the right person to speak on the topic—I’ve embarked on annual cross-country road trips with my family every summer, watching the country unfold from the backseat window as we drove from New Jersey to California and back. And now, decades later, I find myself taking those very same drives again and again—most recently from Texas to Louisiana, New York to Wyoming, and onto California, all in the past four months.
But if you’re not of the temperament to enjoy endless stretches of highway—or have a more limited schedule—you’re in luck. I’ve handpicked some of the top places to visit to witness the most majestic landscapes in America. Each destination was selected to showcase the diversity of America’s land and its people, the topographical and cultural variety that truly makes America great. From the subarctic tundra of Alaska to the volcanic islands of Hawaii, read on for five places that showcase the natural beauty and stunning scenery that define America the Beautiful.
The Best Places to Celebrate America’s 250th
Jackson Hole: The Spirit of the Old West
“Just imagine that you’re a scout. You’re traveling across the prairie for months, it’s all flat, and suddenly you see this,” my mother would say to my siblings and me as we sat in the backseat on our annual drives west to Wyoming. The “this” in question is the extraordinary, ragged peaks of the Teton range. A geological anomaly created by tectonic shifts millions of years ago, these snow-capped mountains loom imperiously above the high alpine desert of Jackson Hole. Unlike the Sierra Nevadas or the wizened hills of Appalachia, the Tetons aren’t yet worn down by the unrelenting forces of gravity—think of them as the teenagers of the Rocky Mountains; impervious to the passage of time and utterly transcendent.
After speculating about the fear and wonder pioneers and Native Americans must have felt encountering the Tetons, my mother would invariably cry once she, too, set eyes upon the mountain range. My siblings and I counted down the minutes to the waterworks, catharsis growing ever more imminent once we spotted the iconic sign on Teton Pass: “Howdy Stranger. Yonder is Jackson Hole, The Last of the Old West.” Though we teased her, I also felt the impact, the sheer profundity of the landscape, from a young age.
One of my earliest and most vivid memories is swimming with my mother in Jenny Lake when I was about 10 years old. We had just arrived at our campsite, and I felt sticky and exhausted from our cross-country trip—“No stopping until we’re past the Mississippi” was the refrain throughout our overnight drives out west. The lake was entirely silent, a rich emerald green, reflecting the snowy mountaintops above. When my mother discarded her fleece and dove into the water, I initially refused to follow. Her teeth were chattering; she looked freezing.
“Katie,” my mother intoned. “Stop that. You don’t want to be the girl who doesn’t get in the water.” (Words to live by.) I dove into the ice-cold freshwater lake and swam over to her. We were both floating on our backs when a hawk flew overhead. “It’s moments like this when you can believe a god exists,” she said.
She was right. And three decades later, her words still ring true. Sure, the town square is more built up, and there are more boutique hotels—the idea of arriving in Grand Teton National Park on a summer Friday and expecting an open campsite is now nothing short of a fever dream. But that ineffable, magical quality remains. Jackson Hole is, if not the most magnificent place on earth, among the most magnificent in America. It’s impossible not to be moved by its beauty, by its romance, by its wildness. The land retains the spirit of a bygone era—the last of the Old West, indeed.
Pacific Coast Highway: California Dreaming
On these annual cross-country drives, California was always the goal—the golden beacon of light, promising sunshine and a respite from life on the road. Cruising California’s Highway 1 as a child was backseat bliss, but nothing prepared me for the thrill of driving it myself this spring. I feared my sparkling memories were padded by wistfulness and nostalgia, not realizing that California’s coastal beauty would reveal itself to me in an even more vivid technicolor once I was an adult, behind the wheel. (Eve Babitz maintained that California requires a sense of childlike wonder to be truly appreciated, but the state’s landscape does make it easier for jaded arrivistes.)
Of course, the allure of the Pacific Coast Highway, or the PCH, isn’t exactly under-the-radar— California 1 is the most searched route in the United States, with over 257,000 searches per month (even more popular than Route 66). And moody drives along the California coast reached their apex in popular culture during HBO’s Big Little Lies (expect another boom when season three arrives later this year). So, I expected the highway, along with its roadside seafood shacks and quintessentially California curio shops, to feel a bit more crowded—and I was pleasantly surprised to be proven wrong.
The 650-mile route stretches from Mendocino’s rugged coastline north of San Francisco down to the Real Housewives–beloved haven of Orange County (a perfect encapsulation of California’s spiritual dichotomy). One thing that unites both north and south, however, is the sweeping coastal views along the Pacific: the jagged cliffs, hazy marine layer, golden beaches, and dense forests—from palm groves to redwoods—that cement the eternal appeal of The Golden State. I set out north from Los Angeles, driving past Malibu into Santa Barbara, up through the underrated San Luis Obispo, and onto Ragged Point to reach Big Sur, where the road truly becomes a winding pathway to paradise.
This trip wouldn’t have been possible last year. The famous 90-mile stretch surrounding the iconic Bixby Creek Bridge just reopened in January, after three years of landslide repairs. I spent my nights at Alila Ventana Big Sur, a hilltop retreat surrounded by redwood forests and panoramic views of the Pacific. On the way home, I stopped for a weekend in Santa Barbara, staying at the Hotel Californian, a Spanish Colonial retreat in the heart of downtown, mere steps from the beach. My dreams of Californication became a reality, and now my only recourse is to plot my next trip.
The Alaskan Wilderness: Into the Wild
The first time I visited Alaska, I was 14 months old, traveling above the Arctic Circle with my parents, and referred to as bear meat. (Is it any surprise that I ended up becoming a travel writer?) Though I can’t claim any memories of that experience, aside from those recounted in my family’s bound travel journals (again: unimaginative career path for yours truly), I’ve since returned to the state several times. Each trip, I’m amazed by the surrounding wilderness and rich cultural history of the indigenous people. They say repeat travelers to the Arctic have “polar fever,” addicted to the wild unknown, and the same can be said for lovers of Alaska. Whenever you visit, you’re bound to discover something new—the weather and landscape remain eternally mercurial, and each season heralds another natural phenomenon that is breathtaking to behold, from wildlife migrations to the aurora borealis.
My first visit as an adult was during the season of the Midnight Sun—nearly 24 hours of continuous daylight—in June 2019. I was hunting for king salmon along the Inside Passage at Waterfall Resort, a remote retreat on Prince of Wales Island, accessible only via (multiple) seaplanes. My basecamp was Cape Fox Lodge in the harbor town of Ketchikan, a city that is lively by day and eerily silent at night, after the daytrippers return to their cruise ships. I tasted Alaskan king crab and browsed storefronts marked with Silver Hands to verify authentic Indigenous art. The Native population accounts for nearly 20 percent of Alaskan residents, and I was lucky to spend a day discovering the town’s ancient history and visiting local galleries with my Tlingit guide, Joe Williams, of the Killer Whale and Eagle clans.
Last winter, I returned to Alaska and ventured further north to the interior, beginning my trip in Anchorage to partake in the annual festivities heralding the opening ceremony of the Iditarod (pro tip: wear your finest furs). Next, I went heli-skiing at Alaska Glacier Lodge in the Chugach Mountains, a state park in Anchorage that would be a national park anywhere else—the sheer scale of Alaska’s wilderness is unimaginable. I eventually headed further north to Fairbanks, where I fulfilled a long-held dream of seeing the Northern Lights at Borealis Basecamp. I’d traveled to the Arctic in Canada and Europe, but only in Alaska did those dancing lights flash across the sky—a mystical and unknowable force of nature best observed in the wilds of America’s northernmost state.
Coastal Maine: The Way Life Should Be
From the Pacific to the Atlantic, my next recommendation has more than a bit in common with Alaska: rugged coastline, hardy locals, overgrown forests, and an extended Canadian border—all while maintaining its quintessential New England charm. Maine’s nickname, Vacationland, is well-earned, though my first extended trip on its coastal islands was not quite the leisurely getaway such a moniker evokes. I spent two weeks sailing off the shores of Hurricane Island with Outward Bound alongside a dozen other high schoolers from around the country. We were all in attendance either as penance and punishment, or in pursuit of the sublime that can be only found after spending three days alone on an isolated island dozens of miles offshore (so, penance and punishment).
To say the trip was transformative is an understatement, and I returned with an incurable crush on a fellow camper (he looked like a Backstreet Boy), and an undying devotion to the outdoors—specifically, coastal Maine. Luckily, you don’t need to follow in my 15-year-old footsteps to fall in love with the state’s magic—instead, book your next trip for this coming June. The richness of the forest, with the ancient spruce and pines, the saltiness of the sea air, and invigorating chill of the Northern Atlantic, the coziness of a bonfire and lobster bake, the promise of an August afternoon at sea—Maine in the summertime is perfection. That’s not to say it’s any less enticing in winter, spring, and, especially, fall, when the leaves turn, the tourists leave, and the landscape is awash in a sea of orange and red.
Though the interior of the state is equally divine, with its own cult following, I am of the mindset that the ocean is always more appealing than a lake, and the resort towns along Maine’s eastern coast are among the best in the world. While I’ll always favor the downeast harbor towns, from Bar Harbor to Little Deer Isle, the southern coast also offers charming getaways, from Kennebunkport, a bustling town all year-round, to the sleepy coastline of Prout’s Neck, which inspired the paintings of Winslow Homer.
Lastly, Portland has become increasingly trendy over the years, a lively city on the water, rivaling the appeal of its namesake on the Oregon coast. Fortunately, you don’t have to choose—a road trip up Route 1 (a scenic 290-mile stretch from southern Maine to the Canadian border) is the perfect way to explore the quaint villages and dramatic coastlines and sample fresh lobster rolls from the roadside shanties and seaside shacks lining the highway.
Hawaiian Islands: Polynesian Paradise
There’s more to Hawaii than surfing and luxury resorts, though they’re definitely a part of its mass appeal. To arrive in the Hawaiian islands is to feel like you’ve stepped into another world. Or at least a separate country, which it was until the U.S. annexed the territory as its 50th state in 1959. And that Polynesian heritage persists in the food, culture, style and customs across all seven inhabited islands, though you may have to venture a bit further off the beaten path to experience local life in Hawaii beyond your luxury resort.
My first trip to Hawaii was as a preteen—I was the plus-one on a press trip with my mother, allowed to miss a week of middle school to see the humpback whales and sunbathe poolside at Four Seasons Maui, the same hotel that served as the backdrop for the first season of White Lotus. And, coincidentally, when I became a writer myself, my very first press trip was to the island of Kauai. I was told on arrival that this wasn’t a coincidence, but part of the universe’s grander plan, so I now credit my entire career to Hawaii.
In the years since, I’ve traveled to all six accessible islands in Hawaii (visitation to Niʻihau is restricted), each unique and beautiful, with distinct cultural identities. Island-hopping is the best way to experience Hawaii—it’s the most geographically remote archipelago on the planet, so once you land in Honolulu, you may as well explore other islands during your stay.
If it’s nature you’re after, Kauaʻi (the Garden Isle) and the Island of Hawaiʻi (also known as the Big Island) offer the chance for exploring stunning volcanic valleys, towering sea cliffs, and lush tropical forests—the Na Pali Coast is one of the most beautiful vistas in the world. For ultra-chic retreats and five-star hospitality, the islands of Maui and Lānaʻi are irresistible (and connected via a one-hour passenger ferry). Book a stay at one of the many elegant resorts in Wailea, along Maui’s southern coast, or check in at the Four Seasons Lānaʻi, which is among the most romantic retreats in the world.
You’d be remiss not to explore Oʻahu upon arrival. It’s the most populated of all the Hawaiian islands, with an eclectic, artistic downtown in Honolulu, and spectacular waves and white-sand beaches along the North Shore. On the opposite end of the spectrum is the island of Molokaʻi, one of those rare places in the world—and particularly a tropical paradise—that is deliberately avoiding mass tourism. I was fortunate enough to be invited by a resident on a recent trip, and participated in an archaeological dig for ancient remnants from the kingdom of Hawaii. The state has prioritized such activities that give back to the local community via its Mālama Hawaiʻi initiative. Mālama means to preserve and protect in the Ōlelo Hawaiʻi language, and in my visits over the years, I’ve paired my sunbathing and mai tais with gardening, tree planting, and beach clean-ups—all of which are infinitely more enjoyable in such an awe-inspiring environment.
Finding ways to give back to the islands and support the local people is ultimately as enriching as any luxury vacation. While we aspire to travel further, we should also aspire to travel deeper. And, on the occasion of America’s 250th birthday, there’s no better time to find community and understanding in the most remote parts of our country. Happy travels!