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So I’m a guy who likes checking things off lists.  I know that’s not how everyone operates, but it’s what I enjoy.  It’s the reason why my travel bucket list includes things like

Here's my county map

Here’s my county map (colored by year of visit)

I don’t pretend to think that all people like to travel like this, but on the other hand, I know that I am not alone – see also the Extra Miler Club, whose motto is “The shortest distance between two points is no fun”.

The other day, someone pointed me towards the website Most Traveled People.

“Counting” where you’ve been

I think that for as long as people have been dividing up land, people have been tracking “how much” they’ve been to.  The first such group that I am aware of was the Traveler’s Century Club, which was first formed in 1954.

(SEE ALSO: What’s the best site to track your flights?)

Then, there is always the age-old question of if you’re going to visit every country, well then… what counts as a country?  The TCC has a list of 321 “countries”, which separates territories that are far removed from their “official” political home (such as Easter Island, Chile, or Guam, USA, or Madeira, Portugal).  There is also the UN list, which counts 193 countries.  The Wikipedia, as always, has you covered!

List of territories according to MTP

Most Traveled People goes the other way, to the extreme.  They count the 50 US states, as well as political subdivisions of Canada, Germany, Russia, Mexico, China and a few other countries, for a total of 875.  Nobody has gotten to all of them – as of this writing Donald L Parrish leads the way with 840.

Personally my map is pretty weak sauce – I have 49.

most-traveled-people-dan-miller-world-map

That’s 45 US States, 1 Canadian Province (Ontario), the Dominican Republic and the German state of Hesse. Most Traveled People also lets you track your UN countries visited as well as your visits to World Heritage Sites

(SEE ALSO: Tracking UNESCO World Heritage Sites)

My unique problem

I have a “problem” in that I was born in Wiesbaden, Germany (my father was in the US Army serving there at the time).  In the 2 years I was there, I know that I visited many places with my mom and dad in Europe, though of course I don’t remember.  I have not yet decided if or how to count those in this regard.  For tracking my US counties visited, I have chosen to track counties visited with my parents before I remember them (like the county of Queens, New York, where I flew into JFK from Germany as a toddler, right before the airport was shut down for the Blizzard of ’78).  What do you guys think?

I love hearing about other people’s travels and “measuring up” – if you have a MTP account, share your count in the comments below!

 

 


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