I was browsing the web today trying to see if someone calculated the optimal route to visit every location mentioned in the song, I’ve Been Everywhere Man, when I stumbled across this website: https://everywhereman.me/. While I haven’t looked very deeply into it, I believe the author just decided to go on a motorcycle trip to every location mentioned, including those in South America and after two years managed to complete the journey. He packed his belongings on his bike, camped, and wrote about his adventures accepting what hospitality the readers of motorcycle forums would offer.
Call me crazy, and it is crazy, but going off for two years on a wild quest is something that sounds incredibly refreshing. How many people are there that are living a life of adventure, quietly soldiering on through deserts, jungles, and glaciers? How many write good blogs? If you know of any, please send them to me, the man finished his journey in 2019.
Helpful visual featuring Johnny Cash’ face(s)
I also learned that because there are several places that have the same name, computing an optimal route is difficult because optimizing the route involves more than just finding the shortest line between a set of points, but also requires the identification of those points as well. (And if we’re being honest, you don’t want to cheat it too much; when the man says Argentina, you’ve gotta go to Argentina the country.)