What is Wandermore Publishing?

Wandermore Publishing LLC is a two-person publishing company that creates books and posts content to encourage individuals to “wander more” and explore their home states. Travelers, historians, and authors Seth and Eliese Varner work to document the history of towns through their writings and photographs, learn more about local communities, and encourage the expansion of small-town tourism throughout the Midwest and beyond. Wandermore books serve as a travel guide, a history book, and a living photo album all in one! Seth is the only person in history to have visited every incorporated community in six states: Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Kansas, North Dakota, and Minnesota. Eliese is joining Seth on his 2026 quest to visit and document all 273 of Colorado’s incorporated municipalities!

THE HISTORY OF WANDERMORE:

The following is an excerpt from Seth's most recent book, "Wandermore in Minnesota," which was published in November 2025.

2020: Visiting every town in Nebraska as a college freshman

Who doesn't love a good road trip? While in broader terms, we may typically think of them as a half-country haul to the Grand Canyon or a car ride to the sandy white beaches of Florida, we take our own miniature "road trips" every day. Whether it's a morning cross-city commute, picking up a prescription from the local pharmacy, or driving down to grandma and grandpa's house for the weekend, we're constantly hitting the road to visit somewhere. There are infinite things to see and do across the country. Each of us has specific interests that have led us to unique destinations throughout the United States — often intentionally, but sometimes unintentionally!

I'm a road-tripper myself, but it's safe to say that I take the term to the extreme. Over the years, I've had the privilege of traveling to every incorporated town in Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, both of the Dakotas, and, as of November 2025, Minnesota! That's about 3,623 communities I've had the pleasure of exploring, despite the constantly changing number of new municipalities and the disincorporation of old railroad and mining or logging towns. Whenever an opportunity arises to hit the road with friends or family, I make an effort to tag along and seek out what makes the region I'm in stand out in its own unique way. 2025 was my busiest travel season yet. Not only did I spend a week on the Maine coast with my wife, Eliese, for our honeymoon (very reminiscent of Minnesota between the bogs, the lighthouses, and the Thomas Dambo trolls!) after getting married in September, but I also took to the wild west for a weekend in Deadwood, South Dakota, for my bachelor party, toured the nation's capital for a week with my dad and brother in Washington D.C. (even going as far out of the way as Charlottesville, VA to tour Thomas Jefferson's Mon-ti-chell-o, prounced differently from Minnesota's Mon-ti-sell-o), and make some side quest trips to Kansas City, KS/MO, and a took a weekend off with my friends in South Padre Island, TX. Between all those excursions, I also completed my sixth Wandermore project over 94 days, visiting every one of Minnesota's 856 incorporated cities.

I've got a constant travel bug. No matter the occasion, I'm constantly looking for another adventure. It's a blast traveling from city to city to take in historical sites like the monuments of D.C. and the National Civil Rights Museum, or to marvel at the beautiful National Parks of the western U.S. Still, sometimes, I like to put my tourist hat and sunglasses away and travel for a different reason. Something more profound and more meaningful. After traveling to every nook and cranny of Minnesota, I documented every municipality through nearly 115,000 photographs, from the sprawling suburbs of the Twin Cities to the mining towns of the Iron Range to the little farming towns with populations in the single digits. I tried to explore the history, architecture, cuisine, and other quirky attractions that set every town or city apart.

Many people are baffled by how I came up with the idea to visit every town in a state. You'd think it's not exactly the idea that somebody comes up with without some backstory or long-winded explanation. And to that, my friend, you guess correctly! It all started with the COVID-19 pandemic in March of 2020. We all know how that went. Life was good and normal, and within a week, the world came crashing down. 9 Workplaces, schools, and universities ushered employees and students out the doors, and everyone was sent home as the world struggled to learn how to deal with a modern-day pandemic. At that time, I was a 19-year-old freshman in college at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. I worked for the Omaha Athletics Department, taking stats for the basketball, hockey, and soccer teams, and I attended in-person classes and lived on campus. One day, I was sitting in class learning about volcanoes and watching the NBA on television. The following afternoon, I was told I had to move back in with my parents in my hometown of Wahoo, Nebraska.

For a month or so, I worked at the local Dairy Queen and attended my classes on Zoom. I played basketball and video games with my high school buddy Austin, who had also been sent home from Concordia University in Seward because of pandemic mandates. We were fine for a while, playing games and cruising Main Street Wahoo, but quarantine began to take its toll on us. Boredom started creeping in as we realized there wasn't much to do in a world where businesses were closed. Public gatherings of any degree weren't allowed. In a time where travel was limited, everything was closed, and making connections was next to impossible, I had the urge to make a something-out-of-nothing summer and do something that (to my knowledge then) nobody had done before: "Hey Austin, want to visit every town in Nebraska this summer?"

The idea stemmed from some core memories from my childhood. In 2009, when I was about 9 years old, my father, Dave, began working on a family tree project. In addition to your typical family tree information like birthdays, names, and the like, he wanted to expand his project to include photographs of the headstones of deceased relatives, the churches they had attended, and the homes they lived in. He recruited little ole' me and his mother to accompany him on a series of road trips throughout Butler and Seward County, Nebraska, to take some up-to-date photos of the sites. While he photographed points of family interest, I had an agenda of my own. Equipped with my disposable Wal-Mart camera, I took photos of the things that caught my interest: population signs, water towers, and sites like the Baloney Shop of Malmo or the green Wal-Mart in York. Things that captured the attention of a third-grader, you know, the important stuff! Around the same time, my mother, Leigh, instilled a love of travel in me by taking my brother and me on a trip to the Caribbean, where I first began to understand that there was an entire world to explore beyond my little bubble in Wahoo. We stopped our road trips as my dad finished the family tree project. I remember poring over a map of Nebraska on our way home from one trip and asking Dad, "Can we visit every town in Nebraska?" To which I likely got a chuckle and a "Maybe someday, Seth" response.

The thought of visiting all of Nebraska's communities must've stuck in the back of my mind, but my obsession with traveling, geography, and writing was more profound. In third grade, I started writing books about "Fluffy the Kitten," the adventures of my favorite farm cat, who loved spending time with his friends. One such rendition of the fifteen-book series was "Fluffy the Kitten Travels the World," in which Fluffy flew his plane to all corners of the globe to take in the world's most famous sights. My classmates Eli and Marcela drew the pictures for my books and helped me present them to my classmates. As I continued to see the world through our family vacations, I became more enthralled with geography and travel. In the fifth grade, I launched my then-second website, "SVGeography." I compiled articles, photos, and videos from around the web, and my teacher, Mrs. Julie Simons, would incorporate them in her lesson plans when applicable. By the time I was fifteen, I was in charge of planning our first actual family road trip to Oklahoma City and Kansas City, a responsibility that I have maintained throughout the years as we've made our way to places like the Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee, the Wisconsin Dells, Washington D.C., and the Grand Canyon and the American West. All things considered, I think it's easy to see how my childhood interests have influenced my career choice to be a traveler and writer, and how a few little trips around my dad's stomping grounds have turned into the ambition to start the pioneer Wandermore project in Nebraska.

On April 22, 2020, Austin and I began our two-and-a-half-month trek across the Cornhusker State. We didn't travel continuously, though. We'd go out for a day and visit a handful of towns, but return to Wahoo to work at Dairy Queen for the next few. It became a weekly thing: every four to eight days or so, we'd hit the road for the day, then come home to sleep in our own beds. The project wasn't very serious for the first few weeks of traveling. We'd visit the towns, take a selfie with something that displayed the town's name—typically the welcome sign—and continue to the next community. Sometimes we'd stop for fast food or wander the town a bit, but we weren't taking pictures, meeting people (since we didn't know much about COVID), or touring businesses, restaurants, or museums. The point of the trips, then, was solely our own enjoyment of getting out of the house and having a little fun with the welcome signs by making funny poses with our Energizer bunny. This little pink plush rabbit, Austin's mom thought, should tag along as our "mascot." At the end of our trip, we planned to hand over the photos to our mothers so they could make a scrapbook of our travels, and that would be that.

I didn't tell my parents about the first few trips. I thought they wouldn't be too pleased with my idea to visit every town in the state amid an ongoing pandemic. However, as Austin and I kept disappearing with our friends for entire days, I eventually broke the news to them about fifty towns in the project. It took a little convincing, but after I insisted that we were playing things safe and mostly keeping to ourselves, they ended up being okay with it. My mom suggested I start sharing my photos on Facebook. I had started an Instagram page for our friends, but she thought we'd reach more people if we shared our travels on the larger platform. Part of me now feels that she just wanted to keep tabs on what exactly her son was doing, gallivanting around in the middle of a pandemic!

Her idea to start a Facebook page was ingenious! Within a couple of weeks of launching "Visit531Nebraska" on social media, we began receiving interview requests from television and radio stations and every small-town newspaper. We couldn't believe it. Within the first month, we gained over 10,000 followers, and comments, likes, and messages poured in. At that moment, I recognized that the project could be 11 much more than just a scrapbook adventure, so I embraced the attention and started incorporating followers' suggestions into trips, and began meeting people.

As the months progressed, we continued to hear stories from locals of their favorite memories of the town and what seeing our few photos (at this time, we only took a few since Instagram, my then-favorite platform, only allowed us to share ten in a single post) meant to them. A theme came to light. No matter how big or small the community, its past and present residents were eager to show their hometown pride and make it known to the world what their community was known for. Austin and I saw this theme unfold as we continued our trek around Nebraska: there's something to do in every town, but you've got to go out and find it. A great example that brings this principle to light is our visit to Monowi, a village with a population of one. It's the smallest incorporated town in the United States, with Elsie being the sole resident, mayor, bartender, and librarian. Even in this community of one, we were able to keep ourselves busy. We ate at the bar and talked with Elsie about her life and her memories of the town that once was. She showed us Rudy's Library, a collection of thousands of books owned by her late husband, and an old church in which she was one of the last people in attendance. What many would hardly consider a dot on the map was a several-hour adventure that took us through the life cycle of a small farming town. Even in a place with a population of 50, 500, or 5,000 people, we discovered that there was always something to learn, do, or explore.

We amassed a following of 21,000 individuals by the conclusion of our trip around Nebraska. We finished our journey in our hometown on July 17, 2020, with a small parade and a celebration. In attendance were Nebraska Stories, a public television series that showcased clips and photos from our adventure around Nebraska, two other news stations, and a couple of hundred community members. It was a fantastic sendoff for an incredible accomplishment. As I read through the Facebook comments on our final town post, I saw several people calling for our adventure to be documented in a coffee-table book so people could relive the journey again and again. I gave it some thought and decided to give it a go. I worked day and night throughout the fall of my sophomore year of college to compile a book featuring photos and brief information about every incorporated town in Nebraska. I detailed what my friends and I saw, heard, and tasted throughout our two-and-a-half-month escapade, shared historical facts and tidbits, and created a living photo album feature using QR codes. I knew the feature would come in handy down the road because, as I traveled through Nebraska, I could someday add more photos of community buildings or inside looks at museums and restaurants as I continued my travels. Since then, thousands of images have been added to the living albums, and those who purchased the books in 2020 can see where else I've visited in Nebraska since the conclusion of the Visit531Nebraska project. The book, a complete afterthought of a project intended to avoid boredom during a global pandemic, has evolved over the years into a resource for restaurants, lodging, festivals, recreation areas, museums, and more.

The book "Visit531Nebraska: Our Journey to Every Incorporated Town in the State" was an incredible success. I'll never forget the feeling of having to take loans from my 12 family members and pour my life savings into buying inventory, or the joy I felt when I held a copy of my published work for the very first time that November. After hundreds of hours of planning, writing, and traveling, I self-published a book and completed the project of a lifetime. As most of you readers already know, the adventure didn't end there either. It was only just the beginning.

2021 to 2024: Trying my hand at other states – the founding of Wandermore Publishing

In March of 2021, I decided to conduct a similar project called "Visit939Iowa" across the Mighty Mo, visiting all 939 incorporated communities in Iowa. Austin joined me on these escapades as well. This time, I made it clear to Iowans that I intended to write a book about Iowa at the conclusion of my travels. Much to my surprise, the people of Iowa rallied around the project, and we were met with equal hospitality and support. I took more photos, met more people, ate at more local eateries, and checked out more sites. Towards the end of the journey, I had taken on a somewhat documentary mindset when I realized that people wanted to see everything left behind in a town. Instead of focusing solely on notable sites like restaurants, historical markers, and downtown areas, by the end of the project in September, I was trying to capture older buildings or even sites like repair shops and city parks. In September, our travels concluded, and I had the book ready to go by November. After another successful trip, the idea cemented in my mind that these projects could become a full-time career.

As I delved deeper into my business classes in the Fall of 2021, I realized I needed to make the business look more professional if I were to pursue it full-time. The company was then just called "Visit531Nebraska," but people were confused why a business with that name had visited every town in Iowa and written a book about both states. I needed to change the name. I loved the term wanderlust but found it overused, so I kept working to come up with a play on words that could showcase what I was trying to do. I wondered. And my thoughts wandered. And they wandered some more. Thirty minutes into my first brainstorming session in the shower, it came to me: Wandermore Publishing, a book-publishing company whose guides combine travel with history to encourage people to explore their home states across the Midwest. I revamped the website, set up the company, and printed the business cards; thus, Wandermore Publishing was born.

The "Wandermore's Visit310SouthDakota" project was launched in February of 2022, and this time I would be accompanied by my college friend and, later, the best man at my wedding years down the road, Jack, to every community. This state was the first project in which I embraced the documentation mindset and began to spend extra time on the road to capture more photos per town than I had in Nebraska or Iowa. I took several laps in the smaller cities to ensure I didn't miss churches or other buildings on the outskirts. I focused on capturing as many "big ticket" buildings and attractions as possible in the larger communities. The project lasted about four months, and it was then that I came up with the idea of starting the Wandermore Travel Fund, allowing people to contribute funds in exchange for having the names of their friends, family, loved ones, pets, and businesses placed in the back of a book. Still in college at the time, Jack and I used the extra funds to spend more time on the road as I put together photos and information for my third book. It was released in August of 2022.

"Wandermore in Kansas," conducted between February and October 2023, was the most comprehensive Wandermore project of the four. After finishing Nebraska and traveling east to Iowa and north to South Dakota, it only made sense to look south and take on the Sunflower State. After 17,000+ miles on the road and over eight months of traveling, writing, and researching, I successfully visited every incorporated community in Kansas. I snapped 50,000+ photos—more than I've taken in any other state by a landslide. It was the first state where I could focus nearly 100% of my attention because, until then, I had always had to work another job and attend school. I remained proactive in my studies from February through May of 2023, during which I graduated with a degree in Business Administration, Marketing, and Management. From then on, I was able to devote my full attention to the project. The extra time and freedom allowed me to meet with hundreds of people from all walks of life: convention and visitors bureaus, chambers of commerce, restaurant owners, attorneys, doctors, and blue- and white-collar workers alike. I ate at nearly 100 local establishments across Kansas and toured over 60 museums. Had it not been for the support I received from the previous three states and from all those who followed the Kansas project and left their tips, history, anecdotes, memories, and kind words, the project would not have reached the level of thoroughness it did.

Things only ramped up with the start of my Wandermore in North Dakota project in 2024. It was my first project where I didn't have to worry about keeping up my college grades or working another full-time job while working on it, and the results showed. After 1,500+ hours of work researching, writing, traveling, and maintaining the Facebook page, what emerged was a collection of photos and history unlike any other ever compiled in North Dakota. And I had SO much fun doing it. The extra time allowed me to shift all of my attention—well, at least most of it, since I got engaged to my best friend Eliese halfway through my travels—to experiencing all that the Peace Garden State had to offer. Upon its October release, it immediately became Wandermore's all-time best-selling book (selling over 2,000 copies in the first two days alone). Its success convinced me that what I was doing was important and feasible to turn into my full-time career.

It's funny to look back and see how a person's career can develop from their childhood interests in hobbies. For a kid who wrote books about his cat, loved traveling and taking photos at a young age, and always showed an interest in geography and history, it seems Wandermore Publishing would've come to fruition at some point. Maybe it's easy to say that now that COVID is essentially a thing of the past, but without that pandemic, who knows if I would have ever had the intention to "wander more" and learn more about Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, the Dakotas, and all the little towns and cities of the Midwest.

2025: "Wandermore in Minnesota" brings national recognition to the Wandermore Project

All that leads us to 2025 and this book you now hold: "Wandermore in Minnesota." From February to November, I thoroughly explored the Land of 10,000 Lakes, and 14 shared my travels with the world on my sixth Facebook page. I shared the following excerpt on my page upon finishing the project:

When I started this journey in February, I knew it would be a lot of work. Trying to capture and share the essence of 856 towns and cities in a single year wasn't going to be easy. But I was determined to make this the biggest and best Wandermore project yet. And, after spending nearly 3,500 hours this year researching, writing about, traveling, and responding to your Facebook messages and comments, this is by far the BEST of the six Wandermore projects I've completed to date! With over 115,000 pictures (about 134 per community), all my time and effort have resulted in a collection of historical excerpts and photos about Minnesota unlike any other collection ever compiled.

Where can I even begin? All year, I've been making these individual wrap-up posts about the highlights of each leg, detailing my favorite bits and pieces of each region. My first time in Minnesota was back in 2018 on a family road trip, where my dad, brother, and I drove all the way up to Green Bay, Wisconsin, and back down through Minnesota on our way home to Nebraska. We did a lot of the typical touristy stuff that other out-of-staters would do. We spent a night shopping at the Mall of America. On the drive up, we took a special interest in Saint Peter's Pearly Gates in St. Peter and the World's Largest Candy Store in Jordan. In Minneapolis, we visited Minnehaha Falls and had lunch at Mickey's Diner in St. Paul, but that was all! We spent a single day in the state, and I did not return until several years later in college to catch some Minnesota Vikings games with my roommates. Heck, even just a year ago in early 2024, Eliese and I spent a whole weekend in Minneapolis/St. Paul did many of the same things I mentioned above! We had no idea that there was SO much more to Minnesota than just the Twin Cities and the roads leading to and from it.

I hadn't expected Minnesota to be so touristy. I've been telling my friends and family all year that every town I've toured has been full of life and opportunities for visitors. Let's take the "Lakes" region, for example. Giant wooden trolls in Detroit Lakes that pop out of the woods when you least expect them to? Hundreds (if not thousands) of little lakes where you'll find anglers and boaters enjoying the waters? A "big foot" in Vining, amongst an extensive sculpture garden in a town with fewer than six dozen people?! Not to mention the legend of the ancient runestone in Alexandria or all of the other "World's Largest" statues that can be found throughout Otter Tail County!

In a single day, I got free beans at a bean festival in Pequot Lakes, then traveled 20 minutes south to Nisswa to cheer on turtle races. On Labor Day weekend, I found myself sitting and chatting with locals amongst thousands of people in the Stillwater and Hastings area, whilst sipping their drinks and enjoying the sunshine on the St. Croix River. In Stearns and Morrison Counties, I went to church more than a dozen times over three consecutive days because so many small-town communities had preserved their one-thousand-plus-year-old edifices. Heck, I even went caving on two different occasions in the southeast corner of the state at Niagara Cave near Harmony and Mystery Cave outside of Spring Valley!

Or how about "Up North?" Like, the TRUE north, by Warroad, Roseau, and Baudette? Before this adventure, never would I have guessed that a little surveying error would place the far northern tip of Minnesota in a spot where you literally have to drive an hour through Canada to reach. I'd be lying if I said I had the confidence to drive across the 40-mile ice road that crosses the Lake of the Woods. Even in places so far away that some might consider them part of Canada, I found roadside oddities, fascinating history, and more than a few people eager to tell me about their communities and showcase the little things that make them special. And don't even get me started on the beauty of Grand Marais and Highway 61 between Duluth and the city on the sea. If you had told me that northeast Minnesota was home to a dozen waterfalls and that you didn't have to travel to Cancun/the Bahamas to feel like you were in paradise, I would've said you were bluffing! All this to say, no matter where I traveled in Minnesota–from the small prairie towns of the southwest like Pipestone and Walnut Grove, to the sprawling ancient forests like Northome's Lost 40, and the beautiful rocky topography that makes up the Iron Range of Hibbing, Biwabik, and all the gems in between, Minnesota truly is full of surprises.

Traveling across Minnesota has been so much more than checking towns off a list. It's been a chance for me to step into the stories that helped shape the Land of 10,000 Lakes into what it is today. From the beautiful architecture on old main streets to the multigenerational cafes and mom-and-pop shops, small-town museums, lakefronts, grain elevators, and everything in between, it's been so inspiring to discover what makes each of your communities unique and to witness your passion for small-town America firsthand. It didn't matter what the population of the town was-there was always somebody willing to offer a helping hand, whether it was inviting me for a meal at the local bar, or offering up an interesting piece of history and story that only a local would know. I talk about this a lot, but I genuinely believe that "Midwest Nice" and hospitality are very real things. Nebraskans claim to be "Nebraskan Nice," and we take great pride in offering a helping hand to those who need it. But you, Minnesota, went above and beyond!

TENS of thousands of Minnesotans, past and present, reached out over the course of the year! You shared suggestions for the best places to eat, and the neatest things to see and do. Many of you offered meetups to share history or provide access to a museum or local business. Others still contributed monetarily to help me conduct this product and share it with the world. A seemingly endless number of you offered words of encouragement and support via the Facebook comments. For all of that, I thank you. Thank you for your kindness and support, and for believing in me to do justice to your state. There are many folks who have reached out whom I have never had the chance to meet. And yet, even to all of you, I have to express my gratitude for taking an interest in my project and for taking time out of your day to interact with me. Your cumulative support and enthusiasm have been the driving force behind this project, allowing it to be the success it is, to the point where the NATIONAL news even picked it up! Who would've thought that Blue Earth and Frost would've been shown off to millions on CBS Mornings when this whole thing started?! Certainly not I!

I saw and did a lot. In the 25,000+ miles I covered this year across 94 days, I snapped over 115,000 pictures, ate at over 200 local eateries and restaurants, toured nearly 70 museums, and visited all but six of the Minnesota State Parks. The gas tank in my 2023 Chevy Equinox–which lost a fuel injector in Montevideo, a fuel pump immediately after returning home from a trip, and a headlight in Itasca State Park when a tree attempted to squash me while driving–was filled 113 times. And, in between all the picture-taking and touring, I still found the time to have a meaningful conversation with 700 Minnesotans. We're not counting gas station clerks or restaurant servers here either. I'm talking about business owners, city officials, town historians, and passionate locals who either caught me randomly on the road or scheduled a time to meet with me! Many of these people are pictured above and are a large part of why this project turned out to be the success that it did. If I'm reading my Facebook analytics correctly, my posts reached 26 MILLION unique people this year!

However, I will also be the first to admit that I didn't see it all. I missed out on museums with one-of-a-kind artifacts. I didn't eat at the best restaurant in every community, nor did I have the chance to discover the beauty of every lake or hike every trail. I skipped hundreds of meetings because I couldn't find time in my itinerary to meet with folks. I never got to see the interior of every church, read every historical marker, or learn the stories of Minnesota's unincorporated communities. And I definitely didn't photograph everything in the state either. There are many hundreds of sites I didn't get to during this project. But you know what? That's okay!! How could I do it all in just a year? How could anyone? Minnesota has SO much to see and do across its regions and communities that it would take many lifetimes to truly experience all the wonder and beauty it offers! I've had many wonderful experiences in Minnesota that I'll never forget. And now, it is right here, at this moment, that I call you to follow in my footsteps.

Get out of your comfort zone. We've all heard of the "throw a dart at the map" concept, and I challenge you to take that idea to heart. Explore what Minnesota has to offer! Get together with your best friends, your family, your coworkers, or anybody else you love and say, "I want to wander more around Minnesota with you!" Take that trip to the local county museum that you haven't been to since the fourth grade, and find something on display that resonates with you and your passions–how about the End O-Line Railroad Park and Museum in Currie? Or the Judy Garland Museum in Grand Rapids? Litchfield even has one of Minnesota's last G.A.R. Halls that you can tour! Drive three hours in a random direction and stop at a random small-town bar for lunch. Ditch the menu and ask the waitress to bring you their house specialty. Maybe you'll end up at Bitton's Roadhouse in Garvin, or at King's Place in Miesville, where you'll have the best burger of your life! Maybe if you're extra lucky, you'll find yourself at Gustaf's on Main in Lindstrom for some authentic Swedish lingonberry pancakes! Tour a haunted hotel in Sauk Centre, like the Palmer House, or better yet, stay at Le Roy's Sweets Hotel! Take a road trip through the Iron Range and learn about mining history, or weave your way through the Driftless area, stopping in Amish country like Harmony and hidden gems like Lanesboro. You'd get a hoot out of visiting Houston, or you might 17 catch a wave from the Jolly Green Giant in Blue Earth! I hear his giant nutcracker friend is just down the road in Lu Verne…

Support a local bakery or flower shop, tour a brewery, check out a book from a historic Carnegie library, and find a nearby lake to read it at, or even find a local to talk to, learn why their town–and specifically, any city in Minnesota–is different from all the rest. If you take nothing else from this Wandermore in Minnesota project, then take this: Every community, no matter rural or urban, population 100 people or 10,000 people, has something to offer. You've just gotta go out and find it. Our towns should be celebrated by our generation and the next for their people and the things that make them one-of-a-kind. Please take the time to "wander more" and explore as much of Minnesota as you possibly can in your lifetime. You never know where the road will take you next!

Thank you, Minnesota, for everything. This project has been an unbelievable and unforgettable journey. I feel blessed to have experienced each of your communities and to have helped preserve them for future generations to admire. My forthcoming Minnesota book will truly serve as a testament to the history, communities, and stories that make your state special, as well as a way for folks to find new places to explore and discover on their own. While I'm heartbroken that my journey in Minnesota has come to an end, I must thank you once again for all the kindness and support you have shown this small-town Nebraska boy throughout 2025. I feel as if I can return to your state at any point and be welcomed with open arms! Goodbye for now, Minnesota, but I promise I'll be back time and time again to "wander more" through your state…Eliese and I are already looking forward to planning our next adventure in the Land of 10,000 Lakes! Thank you, thank you, thank you for everything. And thank you to my awesome travel and life partner, Eliese, for putting up with all the time I spent away from home this year. If it weren't for her never-ending support, I don't think I could have made it to the finish line! Thank you to all 232,000 people who follow my travels on Facebook for helping me expand small-town tourism and generate interest in their storied histories.

2025 into 2026: Wandermore becomes a team of two…expanding the project westward into the Rocky Mountains!

Following its publication, the Minnesota book eventually surpassed the North Dakota edition as the best-selling Wandermore book of all time, further cementing the idea that capturing small-town history and sharing it with the world is important. Eliese and I got married in September 2025 at the historic Durham Museum in downtown Omaha—because of course the Wandermore couple would have to get married at a railroad depot of all places—and she joined Wandermore Publishing full-time at that point. She now manages the majority of the postings and comments on the original six Wandermore pages and packages most of the book orders from our basement while I write and research the year's project state. She helps pick and choose restaurants and attractions to feature as we move from town to town and state to state, directly impacting the businesses we choose to feature. We put up lots of recipes and ideas on the road, then bring them home for her to whip up in our kitchen. Someday, her dishes and the things we've learned over the years might just end up in a Wandermore-style cookbook!

After visiting places like the Southernmost Point in the United States in Key West, and having our first bites of Maine lobster on our honeymoon, Eliese and I started thinking larger. What could we do to spread our message even further throughout the country and encourage folks from all regions to "wander more?" So, after much discussion, we elected to visit all 273 of Colorado's incorporated communities throughout the spring and summer of 2026. Although loved throughout the country for its mountain views, crystal clear waters, and ample recreational activities, we are seeking to show that the Centennial State—which we happen to be visiting in our country's 250th year and Colorado's 150th year—has its own share of hidden gems and overlooked communities that deserve their time in the spotlight. The "Wandermore in Colorado" book will be released in the Fall of 2026, making it the first edition of our history books and guides to be published outside of the Midwest.

Although we plan to experiment with other types of books, like potential "pocketbook guides" on places like Maine's Eastern Coast and the Florida Keys, our heart will always lie with home. We joined the Midwest Independent Booksellers' Association (MIBA) to double down on our promise to sell our books locally – not via big-box retailers like Amazon or Barnes & Noble – and encourage people to physically wander more and explore the same places that we promote across our network of seven Facebook pages (which, by the way, surpassed a quarter-million combined followers at the end of April). We have also recently become members of the Midwest Travel Network to work with local convention and visitors' bureaus and economic development organizations to bring new foot traffic and faces into their communities.

We're just getting started here at Wandermore. We hope you'll join us for the ride by following our network of Facebook pages (linked via the logos below) or by picking up copies of our guides to learn about the rich history and opportunities each state offers. Eliese and I are excited to see what's next, and we couldn't do what we do without the support of folks just like you! 😊

Never stop wandering more,

Seth & Eliese Varner

(Updated 05-2026)