MISSOURI & ARKANSAS!

For our last county collecting trip of the year, we decided to cover some areas in Missouri and Arkansas. Saturday morning, we flew to St. Louis, rented a Mazda CX-50, and hit the road. We spent the rest of the day worming our way through the Mark Twain National Forest in south-central Missouri.

We drove southwest on I-44 for a while, leaving the city of Cuba and working our way down into Iron County. We then headed west, entered Dent County, and stopped briefly in the city of Salem for lunch at Subway. From there, we moved mostly south and west, picking up Texas, Howell, and Wright Counties. We had to go down an access road near the highway to pick up Howell. We may have briefly been on private property. We made a couple of brief stops in Mansfield to see the home of Laura and Alonzo Wilder, as well as their graves in a nearby cemetery. From there, we continued south and west, picking up Douglas, Taney, Ozark, and Christian counties, with the latter being our final county in Missouri. As we neared Branson, we continued south, crossed into Arkansas (picking up Boone County), and drove to our hotel, the Hampton Inn in Harrison. For dinner, we went to a restaurant named Jamie's, where we tried their famous deep-fried bacon.

On Sunday, we started by filling up with gas at a nearby gas station, where the proprietor offered to take me to get some moonshine. I politely declined. We then drove southeast out of Harrison on Highway 65, shortly thereafter, picking up Newton and Searcy counties. Near the small city of Pindall, we turned left onto Highway 235 and drove about 3 miles to the Marion County line. We then turned around and continued south, picking up Van Buren and Faulkner Counties. Next, we took Highway 124 to Martinville. At the city limits, we crossed into Conway County, then turned around and headed back.

Before heading into Little Rock, we stopped in Conway for a late lunch at the Texas Roadhouse. We didn’t have a reason to go into Little Rock other than to say we were there, which is exactly what we did, driving through Pulaski County on the way.

We spent the next hour or so weaving our way northeast out of Little Rock, driving through Lonoke, White, Prairie, Woodruff, and Jackson counties. Jackson County was our last new county reached on this trip. At that point, we set our GPS for the Hyatt Centric in Memphis, where we spent the night. Our hotel was in a perfect location, right on Beale Street. We could even see half of the famous sign from our room. So we walked a few blocks up and down, checking out the sights.

On Monday morning, we walked from our hotel over to Mud Island, where we took a few pictures in front of the Memphis city sign. An interesting recreation of the entire Mississippi River was embedded next to the walking path on the Island. After leaving the Island, we walked back to the hotel, checked out, then drove to the Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. Afterward, we briefly drove into Mississippi before heading straight to St. Louis, where we spent the night at the Hyatt Select right next to the airport. On Tuesday morning, we flew back home.

When it was all said and done, we had picked up 22 new counties and had finished our 40th state. So, what’s up next? We have no more county-collecting trips planned for this year. However, we do have a trip planned for Tulsa in February. Stay tuned!

NEW COUNTIES - 22

                    TOTAL COUNTIES FOR 2026 - 72

                      ALL TIME COUNTY TOTAL - 2931

ALASKA, TAKE 2!

During the first week of September, we decided to take a trip to the state we’ve traveled to the least: Alaska. Alaska does not have counties. Instead, it has 30 boroughs and census areas. Only 14 of these 30 are reachable by car. Of those 14, only 9 are reasonably reachable by car. The other 5 require a crazy amount of driving. So, we used this trip to get the “easy” driving ones, which still took a lot of time.

We flew out on Tuesday, traveled all day, and arrived in Anchorage late at night. As we touched down, we found ourselves in the Anchorage Borough, our first county equivalent of the trip. We picked up our 2026 Chevy Trailblazer, checked into the Hyatt Place Anchorage-Midtown, and went to sleep.

On Wednesday, we started our drive to Fairbanks. We drove north out of Anchorage for about 40 minutes, until we crossed into the Matanuska-Susitna Borough. We then got onto HWY 3 and drove another 3.5 hours to Denali National Park. Along the way, we also crossed into the Denali Borough. The park suffered a landslide five years previously, so bus tours only travel to mile marker 43 until next season. The park road is open to the public for only the first 15 miles. We drove as far as we could, took some pictures, then continued on our way. We will return when the road reopens.

After leaving Denali, we kept driving north and eventually crossed into the Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area. We went even farther, crossing into the Fairbanks North Star Borough and, finally, the city of Fairbanks. We stopped for dinner at the Thai House before retiring to our hotel, the Hyatt Place Fairbanks.

On Thursday, we began the long drive back to Anchorage. The main highway system through middle Alaska is basically a circle between Anchorage and Fairbanks. This time we drove the other half of the circle. Before leaving the Fairbanks area, we drove a little north to see the Alaskan Pipeline. We were the only ones who stopped to visit at that time. Once we'd had our fill, we headed east out of town and briefly stopped in North Pole to take a few photos. We then continued driving east and south on HWY 2, thus crossing into the Southeast Fairbanks Census Area. We drove all the way to Delta Junction, where we stopped to pick up subs from Subway. From there, we got on the Richardson Highway (HWY 4) and headed south. This part of the drive periodically hugged the Alaskan Pipeline. It also gave us one of the most spectacular drives we’ve ever taken. Pictures do not do it justice. We even saw a bald eagle relaxing near the side of the road.

Continuing south on the highway, we crossed into the Copper River Census Area before finally reaching HWY 1 again. But instead of turning onto it to head back to Anchorage, we kept going, since we were only a few miles from the entrance to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. We spent very little time there, though, since there are virtually no paved roads once you get to the visitors’ center. We walked around a bit and took in what we could.

After leaving the national park, we got back onto HWY 1 and headed straight for Anchorage. After checking into our hotel, the Hyatt Place Anchorage-Midtown, we walked across the street and had dinner at the Bear Paw Bar and Grill. The fish was tasty!

We spent Friday hanging around our hotel before transferring to our new hotel, The Wild Birch. On Saturday, we got up early and drove south to Seward. In the process, we entered the Kenai Peninsula Borough. When we got to Seward, we boarded the Orca for an all-day boat cruise into Kenai Fjords National Park. We saw sea lions and porpoises, along with numerous birds and jellyfish, but the highlight was the trip into the Northwestern Lagoon for very close-up views of glaciers. They even fished a chunk of ice out of the water and made me a margarita using it. When we got back to our car, we drove a short distance to the park's welcome sign for a photo.

On Sunday, we drove to the city of Whittier, which is a disembarking spot for cruise ships. The only way to reach the city by car is through the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, which cars and trains share. Halfway through the tunnel is the border for the Chugach Census Area. Since it was raining, we couldn't do much. So, after a brief drive through the small town, we turned around, went back through the tunnel, and returned to our hotel. That evening, we took a red-eye flight back home.

Our trip netted us nine new boroughs and census areas. As mentioned above, we got the “easy” areas in Alaska. It’ll take a lot of return trips to finish the state, but that’s what we’ll do. In fact, we’re coming back for a cruise in May. In the meantime, we're heading to Missouri and Arkansas, so stay tuned!

NEW COUNTIES - 9

                  TOTAL COUNTIES FOR 2026 - 50

                 ALL TIME COUNTY TOTAL - 2909