A Cross-Country Drive

Truckee, California to Seville, Ohio and Return
April 28 to May 12, 2001

Lehman Caves

The Start of the Cross-Country Drive
Truckee, California to Cedar City, Utah

Day #1. For my two week vacation, I decided to drive across the country to visit relatives in Kentucky and Ohio and see some attractions on the way. My first day did not offer much in the way of attractions. My only stop was at Great Basin National Park to tour Lehman Caves. Unfortunately, on my tour was a troop of boy scouts with two scout leaders. The scouts were rowdy and loud, and the scout leaders did not nothing to curb their rowdiness. For myself and the other non-scout participants of the tour, it was not an enjoyable visit.

Where you see a day with italics text, that text is from a postcard that I sent while on the road to chronicle my trip. Like a postcard, it is short and to the point.

Campbell Hill - The Highpoint of Ohio

Campbell Hill, Bellefontaine, Ohio
May 29, 2012

“Are you a highpointer?” The question, despite me being on top of Ohio’s highpoint, caught me by surprise. I hemmed and hawed and sputtered, “No, not really. But I’m here because of this being a highpoint.” As he replied that he was a highpointer, I quickly realized there is no hemming and hawing about being a highpointer. Either you are a highpointer or you are not. And it dawned on me that I was indeed a highpointer.

Where Indiana, Michigan, and Ohio Come to Meet

Steuben County, Indiana   
January 6, 2012

In three states at the same time

Borders are made for snuggling, and some states snuggle for quite some distance. (The nation’s longest border between two states is the Texas-Oklahoma border at 715 miles.) This snuggling can be informal in some border areas where the locale blends the traits of both states into something that can’t be matched elsewhere such as Texarkana and Michiana. However, when three or more states come together, they must meet in a more formal place that comes down to a point.  
  

Where the borders of three states converge into each other, a tripoint, trijunction, triple point, or trifinium (take your pick) is created. There are 62 state tripoints in the United States with 35 on top of land, 24 walking on water, and three somewhere between water and land. Like visiting as many countries as you can or walking to the top of the highest point in every state, there is a certain allure to standing in three states at the same time. Although they may not number as many as the country baggers or peakbaggers, tripoint baggers have a passion to travel and visit each and every trio of states that come together to meet. Jack Parsell is considered one of the first persons to visit all 38 tripoints located on land, and he even wrote a guidebook called “Tri-State Corners in the United States” to help others who share his passion. No news yet on whether Mr. Parsell has navigated by boat to visit the other 24 tripoints located on water.