Right now I am on a train heading west out of Atlanta, Georgia, heading towards New Orleans. Barring any unforeseen developments, I have concluded the Northeast section of my trip. I spent a few hours in Boston and Washington, D.C., mostly walking around trying to keep myself awake while I waited for the next train. Running short on time, energy and money, I mostly confined myself to the most obvious tourist attractions.
There is a lot I am missing on this trip, something that has occasioned comment from people on social media. How can I go to X city without visiting Y attraction? Well, the basic math of this trip is that I am visiting around 40 states in 30 days. There are gigantic gaps in what I get to do. My visit to Philadelphia consisted of travelling through it at 3:30 AM while asleep on a train. From an "objective" standpoint, it might not make much sense to spent three days in Portland, Maine and skip Philadelphia. But even given my constraints of time and money, I don't feel like I am "missing out". It has been the small and unexpected things that have been most rewarding on this trip, and I feel I've experienced as much as if I had the perfectly tailored tourist experience.