The Seven-State Challenge

… in which the title conveys the answer to the question.

Nearly ten years ago, before I started driving several thousand miles around the United States every summer as part of the Dustball Rally, I visited New Orleans for the first time. At some point during the trip, I zoomed out on the map on my phone and observed that just west of the Louisiana state line was Texas, and continuing west, New Mexico, Arizona, and finally, California. I thought to myself, “I’m near the Atlantic coast, but I’m only a few states away from the Pacific coast.” Setting aside the fact that New Orleans is more than five hundred miles from the Atlantic coast, and that driving the “few states” to the Pacific coast would cover more than 1,800 miles (nearly half of it in Texas), I began to contemplate this question: What is the fewest number of states one can traverse when driving between the Atlantic coast and the Pacific coast of the continental United States?

The route I first envisioned when in New Orleans, an efficient but dull journey across the entire length of Interstate 10, covers eight states: Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. Could I find a route to drive from one coast to another in fewer than eight?

I quickly realized that I needed a few ground rules:

1. The route must start at one of the two ocean coasts and end at the other. No heading to the Gulf of Mexico and calling it done.
2. No crossing international borders. Otherwise, I could drive from Washington into British Columbia, make my way across Canada, then cross back into Maine from Quebec, and declare I’d done the trip in only two states.
3. The entire route must be drivable on public roads with a passenger vehicle; in particular, no using ferries to cross bodies of water. This might seem like a minor distinction, but it does matter in at least one case.
4. Driving to the coast doesn’t mean having the vehicle’s tires literally touch ocean water. Getting to a street that is a short walk to the ocean – for example, A1A in Florida – is sufficient.

With that in mind, I explored the continental US road map, plotted routes using Google Maps, and came up with a route that accomplishes this with the fewest number of states. That number is seven.

And I discovered there are multiple driving routes that cover the coast-to-coast journey in only seven states. You can accomplish this with an endpoint in any of the three Pacific coast states, but every seven-state route hits the Atlantic coast in either Georgia, North Carolina, or Virginia. And every route involves going through Tennessee, because it’s the only state both that borders a coastal state and has a road that crosses the Mississippi River. (If you allow for ferry crossings, you can take the Dorena-Hickman Ferry between Missouri and Kentucky and reach Virginia via Kentucky instead of Tennessee.)

What are the actual seven-state routes? If driving from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast:

1. Start in Georgia, North Carolina, or Virginia.
2. Drive into Tennessee.
3. Cross the Mississippi River into either Arkansas or Missouri.
4. If in Arkansas, continue into either Oklahoma or Texas.
   If in Missouri, continue into either Nebraska or Oklahoma.
5. If in Nebraska, continue into Wyoming.
   If in Oklahoma or Texas, continue into New Mexico.
6. If in New Mexico, continue into Arizona.
   If in Wyoming, continue into Idaho.
7. If in Arizona, continue into California.
   If in Idaho, continue into Oregon or Washington.

All of these routes are drivable in the eastbound direction as well

This map shows a visual representation of the different variations of the seven-state route. (You can access a zoomable version in Google Maps.)

I’ve spent some time looking for a six-state solution and have yet to find one. I’m reasonably confident that none exists, but if you know of one (or of a seven-state solution not shown above), please contact me.

All of the above ignores the question of whether any of these routes are worth driving, for either practical or scenic reasons. My personal opinion is that unless you wish to accomplish this arbitrary achievement, they are not.

Final thought: The entire length of I-40 is an eight-state route, though it ends in California before reaching the coast. But it can be turned into a seven-state route by rerouting through either Oklahoma or Texas instead of both.