Articles

I have no idea how many stories I’ve written. Here are my 12 favorite stories. Also I bolded a handful of my favorites below too. And my regular writings for National Geographic Traveler’s blog are here.

• Pho & Beyond: Oklahoma City’s Asian District (Jan 2021; AAA World) Of all things, I wrote a TRAVEL article during the quarantine about my favorite places to eat in Oklahoma City.
• Oklahoma Panhandle Podcast (Sept 2020) I spoke at length about the Oklahoma Panhandle on Gone Ramblin’ a new panhandle-centric podcast.
• Bierock is One Delicious Sandwich You’ve Probably Never Heard Of (August 2020, USA Today’s 10 Best) Behold the Volga-German specialty of Wichita!
• Tourist-Hungry Oklahoma Just Rebranded. Did they get it wrong? (February 2020; Skift) After consulting a panel of 200 volunteers, Oklahoma went with “Imagine That.” I think they needed alcohol (and a smaller panel).
• The World’s Most Prized Peppercorn (January 2020; BBC) Pol Pot stopped farmers in Kampot, Cambodia from growing their prized pepper because the French liked it too much. They’ve started growing it again.
• Talk travel, travel publishing and Oklahoma (January 2020; Lost Ogle) Podcasts are the new article.
• Relax, Unplug from it all in Fiji (January 2020; Alaska Air)
• Unearthing the Viking Heart of New Icelanders (November 2019; North Americana Podcast) I talk Gimli, Manitoba on this wonderful podcast.
• Guide to eating at Ho Chi Minh City’s “Cambodian Market” (November 2019; USA Today)
• Eat Your Way through the Heart of Singapore (November 2019; Alaska Air) A guide to Singapore’s hawker centres.
• Vietnam’s Vast Underground World (July 2019: BBC) How and why to fall in love with the world’s biggest caves.
• Welcome to Vietnam’s Cave Country (June 2019; G Adventures) A guide to visiting Vietnam’s epic caves.
• A History of the Banh Mi (April 2019; USA Today)
• Two Days in Danang, Vietnam (March 2019; Lonely Planet)
• San Diego: National Geographic TV series (October 2018) I hosted four episodes of San Diego for Nat Geo TV. It meant a LOT of time at Balboa Park, which turned 150 during my visit.
• Down to the River (September 2018; Oklahoma Today) Looking at an Oklahoma map, a river caught my eye. The Little. When it hits Arkansas, it marks the lowest point in the state. So I followed the river – or tried to – and ended up finding my spirit animal. (Update: The article won an IRMA “Bronze” for best travel feature.)
• The Balkans, Yes the Balkans, Lead Europe’s New Tourism Push (April 2018; Skift) Stats show Europe’s hottest rising star. I look at them, and remember a certain Bulgarian journal I found in Shumen.
• Best Portland spots for Russian culture need no propaganda (March 2018; San Francisco Chronicle) I love Russian food. You can find a lot of it in Portland.
• Pho the Love (March 2018; Oklahoma Today) Travels amongst Oklahoma City’s thriving Vietnamese-American community.
• Why US Travel Media Won’t Tell People to Visit Russia (February 2018; Skift) This has been brewing for awhile, and after annual best-of lists nearly blanked Russia’s World Cup (as they did for Russia’s Olympics in 2014), I compared travel media’s Russia coverage versus events in Brazil and Matla. It’s not pretty.
• Manitoba roadtrip (October 2017; National Geographic Traveler) Did you know Manitoba has mountains and Vikings?
• The Long Drive Home (July 2017; Oklahoma Today) I try to follow 150-year-old cow tracks from the Chisholm Trail by car in Oklahoma.
• 5 Ways to Celebrate the Chisholm Trail’s 150th Anniversary (July 2017; Texas Highways) When all those longhorns have a place to go, you get yourself some cowboys.
• Star Alliance video series (July 2017; Star Alliance/National Geographic/Wall Street Journal) I host videos to Quebec, New Mexico, Sweden, Thailand and Georgia.
• How modern circus found its home in Montreal (June 2017; G Adventures) It’s not circus, it’s “cirque,” thankyouverymuch.
• Welcome to the Jungle: Mexico’s Lancandón (March 2017; National Geographic Traveler) Fast walk through the midnight jungle
• Get up close with wildlife in Mexico’s Magdalena Bay (March 2017; National Geographic Traveler) How I learned that whales have a sense of humor
• Dive into Mexico’s Sea of Cortez (March 2017; National Geographic Traveler) That time a sweet sea lion, with long moustache, came to flirt with me in the sea
• Discovering Hemingway’s Havana (January 2017; Alaska Airlines) On the footsteps of Cuba’s most famous American resident
• Homerun in Matanzas (January 2017; Alaska Airlines) Cuba’s first home to baseball
• Namibia: The World’s Great Nothing (January 2017; G Adventures) Fun in the world’s oldest desert
• Balkans Roadtrip (October 2016; G Adventures) From Slovenia to Kosovo by car.
• Melbourne’s Hippest Neighborhoods (October 2016; National Geographic Traveler) Honestly it’s not my favorite headline, but a print feature on my one-time home down under.
• Canoeing down the Yukon (October 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Kluane National Park (October 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Whitehorse, Yukon (September 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Why you should do a homestay in Thailand (September 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Clam-digging in Thailand’s Koh Klang (September 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Homestay in Trat, Thailand (August 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• Mud: Village charm in Thailand (August 2016; National Geographic Traveler)
• How to Dock-hop on New Hampshire’s Lake Winnipesaukee (June 2016; National Geographic Traveler) Part of my New Hampshire series as Digital Nomad, this one on Adam Sandler’s favorite lake.
• Ranking US Panhandles (April 2016; National Geographic Traveler) I rank all ten, even the one that claims “all there’s to do here is have sex and go to movies.”
• Great Wall of Kotor (February 2016; BBC Travel) Kotor, Montenegro is on a fjord-like bay in the Balkans. What surprised me most was what ran up the mountain from the old town. I made a video/article about it.
• Walk around Suzhou, China (January 2016, Alaska Air) In China, towns of 14 million seem quaint, laid back and quiet.
• Dada turns 100 (January 2016, National Geographic Traveler) Dada, the absurdist art movement, turns 100 in its birthplace of Zurich
• Shanghai, Bite by Bite (January 2016, Alaska Air) I’m not a foodie, but I eat food. So in Shanghai, I went all out.
• Beyond Half-Dome: Yosemite Secrets (November 2015, National Geographic Traveler) Five things most people miss at Yosemite.
• Channeling John Muir at Yosemite’s Hetch Hetchy (November 2015, National Geographic Traveler) I’ve not camped in the wilderness in a couple decades. So I did, with help.
• Backcountry Bliss: California’s Hwy 108 (November 2015, National Geographic Traveler) I met “the tree man” along this curvy two-laner on the outskirts of Yosemite.
• Three California Gold-Country Towns Outside Yosemite (November 2015, National Geographic Traveler) Old-time hotels and trains.
• Samburu Snapshot (September 2015, National Geographic Traveler) When an elephant stands between you and your Wifi.
• Searching for kudu in Kenya’s Chyulu Hills (September 2015, National Geographic Traveler) Hemingway’s “Green Hills” MIGHT have been this range in southern Kenya. And it might not have been.
• The Art of Being Present (September 2015, National Geographic Traveler) Walking in Kenya’s Rift Valley.
• Eastern Oregon: Beer! (August 2015, Los Angeles Times) Everyone knows Portland beer, but out east — in Oregon’s wild east — may be the state’s best.
• The Last Stop: Oklahoma Panhandle (August 2015, Oklahoma Today) A roadtrip with Uncle David to Oklahoma’s rectangle of once-unwanted plains.
• Rising Stars of Kenya’s Masai Mara (August 2015, National Geographic Traveler) Digital Nomad trip on/off Kenya’s great wildlife destination.
• Five Great American Roadtrip Books that Aren’t “On the Road” (Transitions Abroad, June 2015) Really, there is life to the road beyond Jack Kerouac.
• Why We Need “Travel Experts” (National Geographic Traveler, March 2015) We do, right?
• Ranking the US Interstates, 1 to 66 (MapQuest, February 2015) Includes a new nickname for all 66. My favorite list I’ve ever written.
• A Literature Journey of Monterey & Big Sur (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, November 2014) Ain’t just Steinbeck.
• Treasure Island (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, November 2014) Finding life in San Francisco’s “zombie apocalypse.”
• A Case for Corvallis, Oregon (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, November 2014) Oregon State University’s surprising hometown.
• Earning your Boots in Eastern Oregon (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, November 2014) Cowboys, big fungus and forgotten Chinatowns.
• Biking Portland’s Icons (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, October 2014) I moved to Portland realizing I had no idea what the city looked like. What are its icons beyond bikes and vegan tattoo parlors? I biked around to ask locals.
• Pierre Parallel (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, September 2014) Dreamy back roads off the interstate  of central South Dakota.
• Finding Space in the Black Hills (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, September 2014) In South Dakota’s top destination, I managed to miss Mt Rushmore.
• Meet Wyoming’s Bighorn (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, September 2014) A tipsy sheepherder mapped out a mountain drive he used to take drunk, so I took it.
• Gravel Valentine (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, September 2014) A geologist shared the secret of seeing Wyoming.
• Chasing Purple in Estes Park (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, August 2014) Following Isabella Bird’s classic 1873 trip from A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains.
• How to Love the Flatlands (Transitions Abroad, August 2014)
• Finding life in a DC swamp (National Geographic Traveler’s Digital Nomad, July 2014) No, DC wasn’t built on atop a giant swamp. But yes, DC has some swamp.
• How to be a Travel Show-Off (Transitions Abroad, July 2014) It’s not that we can’t show off, it’s just that we need rules.
• Philadelphia, Birthplace of American Weird (National Geographic Travel’s Digital Nomad, July 2014) No “keep weird” campaigns required here.
• Roaming the Bronx Champs-Élysées (National Geographic Travel’s Digital Nomad blog, July 2014) Art, art deco, banana pudding, opera house hotels, Poe t-shirts!
• Biking to Walden Pond (National Geographic Travel’s Digital Nomad blog, July 2014) Did you know you can swim in Thoreau’s front yard? I didn’t.
• See Chuck Berry for $35 (MapQuest’s Summer Travel Quests, June 2014) St Louis, Missouri
• Broken Hill: Where Mining & Mad Max Sequels Refuse to Die (Atlas Obscura, June 2014) Outback city that’s more familiar than you realize.
• Walking: The Ultimate Digital Detox (National Geographic Traveler, June 2014) Did you know Americans walk half as much as Australians or Canadians?
• How to make a great travel itinerary (Transitions Abroad, May 2014) Have crayons handy? You’ll need them.
• Road Trip: Route 66 (National Geographic Traveler, March 2014) Not all the highlights are nostalgic.
• Are Museums Overrated? (National Geographic Traveler, February 2014) At least how we travelers see them can be.
• How to dislike a destination (Transitions Abroad, February 2014) We don’t have to like every place we go, but we should never treat a nation, a region, a culture, a people as a restaurant.
• How to be an Ugly American (Transitions Abroad, January 2014) So begins my new monthly column on “How to Enjoy the World” with Transitions Abroad.
• The Trends that are Driving 2014’s “Top Travel Destinations” Lists (Skift, December 2013) I read a bunch of lists, drew maps, and came up with some patterns.
• How to Accept Your Donkey: On/Off the Robert Louis Stevenson Trail (Perceptive Travel, December 2013) A walk, a drive, and a flat-out sprint from a rugby team’s worth of cows in France.
• The Fountain of Youth (National Geographic Traveler, November 2013) It’s kind of like Jack Black’s funny shorts in The School of Rock. Except real science backs it up.
• Are Bikes the New Tour Bus? (National Geographic Traveler, November 2013) There’s a bike-lane fever around the world. Why let the commuters have all the fun?
• Travel’s ultimate destination: home (National Geographic Traveler, October 2013)
• The Secret to Remembering Travel (National Geographic Traveler, September 2013) It’s not just slowing down, it’s stopping. (Warning: Includes references to moustache sketches.)
• Visiting Cleveland, on Purpose (Men’s Journal, September 2013) What would you pick, A) a sandwich or B) Cleveland? You get both if you pick “B.”
• Riding the Rails with Young Americans (National Geographic Traveler, August 2013) I got the lone Gen-X berth on the Millennial Trains Project. Wow.
• August in Osage County (Men’s Journal, August 2013) You know August: Osage County, how about Oklahoma’s Osage County in August?
• The Original Travel Writer’s Trail (Men’s Journal, July 2013) On the Robert Louis Stevenson Trail in the Cévennes of France
• Gettysburg Wants You (Gadling, July 2013) That time I went to Gettysburg a civilian and left a re-enactor
• How to travel like a travel writer (National Geographic Traveler, June 2013) Part of my series with NGT.
• Is it Tulsa Time? (Gadling, May 2013) Opening of Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa’s Brady District.
• Native America’s Son (USA Today Travel magazine, 2012) Why Oklahoma is the only state with an exclamation point!
• Ancient Burma’s playful side (BBC.com, 2012) Biking around the temples of the remote Mrauk U, an ancient Rakhaing kingdom reached by slow boat.
• Why Cleveland Rocks (Daily Oklahoman, 2012) Cleveland has the Rock’n’Roll Hall of Fame for reason.
• Q&A: BBC’s Forms of Indication Column (BBC, 2012)
• The Black Sea by Moskvitch (Lonely Planet Magazine/BBC.com, 2011) A road trip up the Black Sea coast in a 1972 Moskvitch? Dreams do come true.
• Why You Should Go to Mexico (CNN, 2011) Sometimes perception is only part of the story.
• Why You Should Visit a New Destination (CNN, 2011) ‘New’ travel is the fountain of youth.
• Why you should visit the Gulf Coast (Huffington Post, 2010) I visit the oil spill, and find a different story as covered by mainstream media.
• World Cup of Travel: Spain vs Netherlands (World Hum, 2010) Soccer’s great match, as determined by sketches and travel sites.
• Six Spots to Relive ‘Travels with Charley’ (World Hum, 2010) Including one Steinbeck should have gone to!
• To Cruise or not to Cruise? (CNN, 2010)
• Bogota Meets the World (New York Times, 2009) Colombian capital’s Macarena neighborhood.
• Following Chekhov to ‘Hell’ (World Hum, 2009) The world’s first gulag tourist was the writer Anton Chekhov. I follow his trip across Siberia to the world’s worst place.
• Home-Field Adventure: Baton Rouge vs Gainesville (ESPN, 2009) College football towns, as destinations, go head to head.
• Home-Field Adventure: Austin, Football’s Worst-Kept Secret (ESPN, 2009)
• Home-Field Adventure: Austin vs Norman, Oklahoma (ESPN, 2009) Closer than you’d think.
• Home-Field Adventure: Columbus, Ohio (ESPN, 2009) I loved talking to the Buckeye fan who hadn’t missed a home game since 1944.
• Things to do on Martha’s Vineyard (Wall Street Journal, 2009) Aimed to help the Obamas’ summer vacation plans.
• Travel Writing as a Political Act (World Hum, 2009) Review of Rick Steves’ book.
• Extravagance at Russia’s Edge (New York Times, 2008) New things afoot in Vladivostok.
• Partying Amid Cold-War Ruins (New York Times, 2007) Sofia, Bulgaria’s Studentski Grad.
• Searching the BAM for Russia’s Lost Moustache (Perceptive Travel, 2007) Travel is better with moustache charts.
• A Burmese Capital Built for Kings & SUVs (Perceptive Travel, 2008) A visit to Myanmar’s new capital, Naypyidaw
• ‘The Worst Guidebook Author Ever’? (World Hum, 2008) Review of Thomas Kohnstamm’s ‘Do Travel Writers Go to Hell?’
• Boom! goes Bogota (Houston Chronicle, 2007) The typo on “Colombia” really wasn’t my fault. It hurts me to see that. But I did manage to write about tejo, and Colombia, for this syndicated piece before almost anyone, so I’m including it here, dammit.