An Earth Sized Roadtrip

How big is our planet?

Photo Credit: Tim Brown

The earth is a pretty big place, so it can be tricky to get a sense for it. Here’s one way I try. It’s about 800 miles from where I am on the north side of Chicago to New York City, say Central Park, or Times Square. It’s not the most exciting road trip, but it’s doable in a day. You get on I-90 and stay on it 5 or 6 hours until it splits off to I-80 by Cleveland. Stay on 80 through Pennsylvania, across New Jersey, till you finally get to the Holland tunnel, just under 12 hours after you left if traffic was good, and you didn’t stop for gas or to pee. 13 hours is more realistic, and at least kinder to you bladder. 

Suppose you kept doing this. Not just today, but drive back tomorrow, and then back again the next day: repeat. To travel the full circumference of the planet, you need to do this trip every day for an entire 31 day month — say October: at least the leaves changing is quite pretty! And then, on the first day of November, drive an extra hundred miles, just to finish the trip!