It all went by so fast.
My focus while standing on the stage in the banquet hall was simple. I needed to start walking in a straight line once Dave Goren, executive director of the National Sports Media Association, said the words “From North Dakota.”
The words he said after that were a blur.
I didn’t even glance towards the room of hundreds of people in suits and dresses, many of them well-accomplished and veterans of the sports media industry. Almost nothing Goren said in his quick spiel about me registered as I walked parallel to the black and red curtains that lined the stage. Before I knew it, I was shaking hands with recently-retired NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski and posing for a picture taken by a professional photographer.
Immediately upon stepping off the stage, I was ushered with a parade of “Congratulations” and brought over to a photography set to pose for another photo, this one with just me and the “Sportswriter of the Year” plaque I had just received.
Then it was time for dinner.
But this night in Greensboro N.C, was just the midway point. From my departure on June 20, to my arrival back home on July 5, I drove 4,423 miles through 17 states in a trip that spanned city skyscrapers and quiet forests. In the moment, it went by in a flurry, just like that trip across the stage. Yet, when I stop to think about specific moments or places I traveled, they feel incredibly distant, as if months have already passed. The last two weeks were filled with driving, hiking, baseball, general exploring, movie locations, fancy hotels, sketchy hotels and of course some Fourth of July fireworks to cap it all off.
It started with seven nights in seven different places.
I achieved three new states on this trip: Wisconsin, Tennessee and Arkansas. It got me up to 44 out of 50 states. I spent the first three nights in Wisconsin — a different city each night — to see some of the state that I’d been close to but had never actually stepped foot in.
Fittingly, my first stop after leaving Devils Lake, N.D., was Devil’s State Park. Notice the apostrophe. It’s also not a town; it’s just a lake and a surrounding park. On the way there, I passed through and stopped for gas in a little place called Menomonie, best known as being the hometown of longtime Devils Lake radio announcer Mark Beighley.
After a long drive on Day 1 that ended in West Baraboo, Wis., I only required minimal driving time for the next few days. I got up early on June 21 and did a relatively short but fairly exhausting hike through a sparsely-attended Devil’s Lake State Park. Unbeknownst to me beforehand, the trail extended through a giant pile of rocks, with a curved staircase path only barely visible to the naked eye. While it wasn’t the longest hike, it had me huffing and puffing towards the end as I climbed all the way up to a cliff view of the lake.
From there, I went on a group tour of an underground cave before spending the next two nights in the major cities of Madison and Milwaukee. Madison is a solid college town with a vibrant and colorful downtown area. My hotel, which I booked for a weirdly cheap price considering the high quality, was right across the street from the Wisconsin state capitol building. I had to deal with things I don’t usually have to worry about at the types of hotels where I usually stay: things like paying for parking and taking an elevator to the eighth floor.
Milwaukee was a cool city, too, with a downtown market kind of reminiscent of the one in Seattle, Wa. I spent hours at the National Bobblehead Hall of Fame and Museum — in fact, I was the third person from Devils Lake to visit there, according to the map of pins they had on display.
My next stop on the trip allowed me to get a more substantial feel for Chicago, Ill. I’d been there once before, but only for about an hour and a half. I spent the night this time and structured my day similar to the ones in Madison and Milwaukee, using the majority of the morning and afternoon to explore downtown and the various stores, restaurants, parks, etc. Except, in the case of Chicago, the whole city essentially feels like a downtown, not too different from New York City. Lots of people with suits and briefcases looking rushed.
I also took in a White Sox game at Guaranteed Rate Field, a new MLB ballpark for me.
It was a good thing I spent my evening doing something fun, because the hotel I booked turned out to not be the most pleasant place. I had a bad feeling about it when I walked in and saw a sign saying, in all caps, that they are no longer associated with OYO Hotels, despite the fact that they were very much listed as being associated with OYO Hotels on every web source.
I was handed two things upon checking in: my room key and a TV remote. I walked with my room key in one hand and TV remote in the other as I trudged my bags of clean and dirty clothes — one for each — up the stairs to my room, where I was greeted with a single roll of toilet paper sitting on the nightstand. The bed had two tiny pillows smushed into a single, disproportionately-sized pillowcase, and a small TV sat across the room, too low to comfortably view from the bed.
The bathroom had no railing for either the toilet paper roll or the single towel. The whole room was abundant with chipped paint and stains.
This was four days before I’d be staying in a luxury resort.
On the way farther east, I took a convenient, welcome stop in Columbus, Ind. It was my second visit there, as a big fan of the 2017 movie “Columbus” that filmed all around the city. I took a relaxing stroll through mostly the same sites I saw in 2023, with the addition of a few I didn’t get to last time.
Columbus was a gateway to Appalachia.
It was here where the drives started getting more tiring and even nauseating at times. After getting to West Virginia and eating at a pizza place right by the border of Kentucky in a town called Kermit, I ventured onto an extremely skinny, hilly, curvy road with cars blazing through.
For over 100 miles.
This was one of the most remote parts of West Virginia. If you’ve seen the documentary “The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia,” I drove through the family’s home neighborhood of Boone County. The roads are skinny, kind of like North Dakota backroads. Except there are two major differences. The roads constantly curve and are lined with trees, so you can’t see very far ahead of you and passing is nearly impossible. They’re also hilly, which is very unlike North Dakota. I had to ride the brakes most of the way to avoid skidding off the road.
But that’s apparently not a problem for West Virginia drivers. I drove as fast as I comfortably could, yet I still found myself getting tailgated nearly the entire time. The laws of physics must not apply to those drivers, as they were somehow able to speed through those relentless curves with no issue. They didn’t just want to go the speed limit; they wanted to go 20 over, while I was struggling to even stay within 10 under.
During this portion of my trip, I took a break from the big cities and hiked through the wilderness. I came dangerously close to running out of gas within the confines of New River Gorge National Park, where I learned — delayed by more than an hour because of no service — that the New York Mets had fired manager Carlos Mendoza.
I made it down to the state of Virginia on June 26, the day before I’d be arriving at the Grandover Resort and Spa in Greensboro, N.C. But it seemed longer than that. I got up while it was still dark out and visited a waterfall, an overlook and a state park, navigating through more of these cartoonishly windy roads past swaths of farmland. Within roughly the first 90 minutes of driving that day, I must have had to avoid or slam the brakes in front of 10 deer. I saw more deer than humans that morning. The road was practically a deer obstacle course.
I hiked at Grayson Highlands State Park, a filming location from the underrated 2018 gem “Maine,” where I quickly found what I was looking for and then decided to keep going once I noticed that the Appalachian Trail — which extends from Georgia to Maine — goes right through the park.
With plenty of time still, I ended up hiking nearly 10 miles on the Appalachian Trail in Virginia, going southbound for about five miles before turning around. The pictures don’t do justice to how open and wide it felt out there. There were no streets, cars or cities in sight. Just nature.
It was kind of cold that morning — good hiking weather — but about three miles in, it started pouring rain and I got absolutely drenched while walking alone with no supplies in the middle of the wilderness. The farther away I got from the state park, the fewer people I saw. Those I did see were actual, dedicated backpackers, some of whom were likely doing the whole thing. There is something sort of appealing about an undertaking like that. But that’s an adventure for a different day.
I managed to hike back to my car, drive down to a North Carolina mountain where a scene from “Forrest Gump” was filmed and then drive east to Greensboro in time to pull into the Grandover parking lot at a reasonable time in the evening. It was a giant building, full of decorations, staff and accessories that I would never see in my usual type of hotel. A bit of a step up from that Chicago place.
Not only that, but I learned shortly before arrival that the Norway World Cup team had been staying in our hotel for the last month or so. The hotel had extra police and security presence, including two black cop cars parked out front. The entire second floor was closed to public access. While lounging around the hotel, we laid eyes on Norway’s coaching staff and several players. My dad grabbed some pictures of the players all leaving as they departed for a game in Dallas, Texas, later that week.
For the three nights I got to stay at the Grandover, I was in a different world from where I’d just been. The fast-paced trip hit a speed bump. We spent a relaxing day in Greensboro — with a side tour of watching dogs jumping into a water container while competing against each other — before attending the welcome reception that evening. I had a chance to connect with some of the other NSMA sportswriter and sportscaster winners from around the country, including National Sportscaster of the Year Sean McDonough. I told him a little about Devils Lake and the kinds of things I cover up here.
We visited the nearby home of “Bull Durham” the next day in anticipation of the big event everyone came there for: the awards banquet. It turned out to be a fun, valuable experience. There were plenty of famous people in attendance, including New York Giants coach John Harbaugh, former MLB player Jeff Brantley and recently-retired Washington Nationals announcer Bob Carpenter. The sportswriter awards were handed out early in the evening, so I got to enjoy the rest of the night while eating a good meal and connecting with some more people in the industry.
But there wasn’t much breathing room after it was over.
I said my goodbyes and then got up while everyone was still sleeping to hit the road again. I drove off from Grandover into the North Carolina wilderness, where I slipped near a waterfall and got a scab on my knee as a souvenir.
After making it through a brutal road-work traffic jam in western North Carolina, I finally made it to my 43rd state: Tennessee. Right on the border, I hiked a little bit more of the Appalachian Trail, which was completely empty. I didn’t see a single person. It was super hot that day, though, so I didn’t hike for nearly as long as my previous stop on the trail.
I spent two nights in Nashville, a fun and loud place to walk around. I also visited the home of the Vanderbilt baseball team and attended a Nashville Sounds — well, a Nashville Hot Chickens game that night — against the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp.
From there, I cut through the corner of Arkansas to get my 44th state. I parked at a state park by the border, then walked to Missouri to eat at a place fittingly called Stateline Plaza Restaurant. Then I walked back to Arkansas, got in the car and drove back into Missouri, where I checked out some more trails and parks before heading to St. Louis for the next two nights.
This was my first time in St. Louis. Some of the city was surprisingly ugly and dead, but there was a nice place called Forest Park to explore, plus the historical Busch Stadium right in the heart of downtown. There was, randomly, a Mr. Beast commercial or promo of some kind being filmed on the Busch Stadium field while I went on a tour there.
I visited the famous Gateway Arch, which happened to be holding a massive Fourth of July celebration (on July 3). There were enormous crowds and various performances, including one from a famous rapper and actor named Ludacris. My final night in St. Louis, and penultimate night of the trip, ended in a fireworks and drone show in the dark night sky above the towering arch monument.
I ended up spending my Fourth of July in a place I’ve become oddly familiar with: Omaha, Neb. I’ve been there a handful of times since moving to North Dakota, mostly to see baseball, and wouldn’t you know it, I ended up at a baseball game again after snagging last-minute tickets to see the Omaha Storm Chasers. I got 13 innings of Triple-A baseball and watched a postgame fireworks show from the outfield grass.
As the final bursts of light rocketed into the air, I knew the trip was coming to its close.
So I made the familiar and fairly dull drive back to Devils Lake the next day, just trying to get home at that point. But I came back with two weeks full of memories, having gone to new places, packed cities and remote forests alike, while also picking up an award along the way. Being around so many people passionate about sports media, while getting to see more of the country, made me extra hungry to get back to Devils Lake and keep reporting on the never-ending, never-boring cycle of sports that circulates through this little town.