I thought reading this poem was a nice way to start a Monday morning.
“High Flight”
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds–and done a hundred things you have not dreamed of
Wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlight silence. Hovering there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the hand of God.
-John Gillespie Magee Jr.
One of my favorite things about traveling is going back later and mapping out everywhere I’ve been. The internet is full of such tracking sites, but I found a unique one last week. It’s called MostTraveledPeople.com.
This site goes beyond just listing the world’s countries. It lists 761 places that people need to go to. The site comes up with that number by doing things like subdividing countries. Instead of having Canada count as one country, it counts as 13 places instead as each province and territory counts as one location. So the site gives credit to people who really go and explore a country instead of just setting foot in one corner of it. At this point, no one has been to all 761 places yet. The founder of the site, Charles Veley, is the closest with 710 places. Some of the places that are included are a bit on the quirky side, like the Northwest Angle, which is a piece of Minnesota that pokes above the 49th parallel that marks most of the border between the US and Canada.
As for my stats, I just squeaked into the top 5,000 travelers with a ranking of 4,999 out of all registered users. So far I’ve been to 27 of the 761 places listed. It’s not my goal to go visit all 761 places, but it’s a good motivation to go out and try to get to more of those places.
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