Back roads, open expanses, minimal pavement — the TransAmerica Trail is the scenic route across America. It’s the country’s longest off-road trail: a continuous network of mostly unpaved roads that connect from coast to coast, spanning 5,900+ miles and winding through remote areas that still feel wild and untouched.

The TAT has no official signs or single path. To find it, you need to be in the know — making it popular with off-roaders and overlanders.

To make the trail more accessible to more people, Ford and Google Maps set out to do something that’s never been done before: put the entire TransAmerica Trail on Street View for anyone to explore from anywhere.

In August 2025, three off-road-capable Ford vehicles and a small team of us set off to take on the trail in one go. Equipped with Google Maps’ new Street View camera, a Ford Bronco^® Badlands^® captured all the imagery, while the Ranger^® Lariat^® and Expedition^® Tremor^® carried the rest of the crew and necessary gear.

The Ford convoy trekked from the coast of Oregon to the coast of North Carolina, encountering all types of terrains, obstacles, and surprises over the course of 32 days, capturing the entire trail for Street View.

Along the way, we camped, stayed at motels, cooked meals on the side of the road, and ate at charming small-town restaurants, all while following Tread Lightly! principles: Always stay on the trail, and leave places as we found them. Over the course of the journey, we went from a group of mostly strangers to a little temporary family, taking on this off-road adventure together.

Day 1 – Oregon

Minutes after getting onto the trail, the ground was already rugged. Equipped with the available Sasquatch^® Package, the Bronco Badlands was the ideal Street View capture vehicle for our team. G.O.A.T. Modes^® (Goes Over Any Type of Terrain), high ground clearance, and 35-inch rugged all-terrain tires led the team through all the intense terrain we knew we’d encounter.

About five hours in, we hit our first roadblock: a complete lack of road. We pulled up to see the path we were supposed to take was washed out, leaving a huge hole in the forest floor.

But the guiding principle of the TAT is simple: Avoid pavement whenever possible. So, the team rerouted and got back on track.

Just a few hours later, the Ford convoy pulled up to our next obstacle: a herd of cows blocking our path. We waited for them to move on, excited about the unique off-road imagery we were capturing for Street View.

At the end of our first day, we unpacked our gear and equipment from the Ranger truck bed for the night. If this is how day one went, we knew we were in for a real adventure.

Day 8 – Utah

“And to our left, we have absolutely nothing,” one of the drivers joked on the radio.

Somewhere out in the Great Salt Lake Desert, our three vehicles dotted the empty landscape. The terrain was rough and salty, the air dry and dusty, the sun brutally bright, and the horizon eerily endless.

We were truly in the middle of nowhere. As the light eventually started to fade, we got to work setting up camp.

During the day, the Expedition Tremor lived up to its name and tackled the toughest of terrains, but at night it became the team’s basecamp. The multifunction Ford Split Gate and available Cargo Tailgate Manager served as a gear organizer, luggage rack, kitchen counter, and late-night journaling table, all within a matter of hours.

Huddled around the vehicles, we marveled at the expansive and otherworldly salt flats around us as we waited for water to boil. Tonight’s menu: freeze-dried chicken tikka masala.

Day 16 – Colorado

Eight days later, we arrived at what we expected to be the most challenging and treacherous part of the trail, the San Juan Mountains. The day’s goal was to get over Ophir Pass, a shelf road cut into the side of a mountain, with just enough space to fit a vehicle.

We started our ascent up the mountain, weaving through pine forests and crossing snowmelt streams. To our left, nothing but a vertical wall of rock. To our right, a steep drop into the valley below. Up there, tire placement is everything. The margin of error is just inches.

The sheer drop of the cliff may have lightly rattled some of our nerves, but our confidence in the vehicles never wavered. The Bronco, Ranger, and Expedition all handled the loose rocks and mountain ruts with precision and ease, carefully crawling to reach an elevation of 11,789 feet.

At the top of the pass, the team took a few minutes to take in the stunning panoramic view, stopping to talk to a driver in his F-150 Tremor who was doing the same. We all agreed: It’s worth the climb.

Day 32 – North Carolina

Seeing the ocean again was an amazing feeling. After 32 days, we had crossed 13 states and captured hundreds of thousands of off-road images for Street View. We’d made it.

As we started to unload a month’s worth of gear, we reflected on how well each of our vehicles handled the trail. From coast to coast, up and down mountains, the Ranger truck bed kept our most essential supplies safe — tents, water jugs, chainsaw, extra camera equipment. With the available FX4^® Off-Road Package, Ranger navigated the often-changing and unpredictable terrain. It was our off-road workhorse.

While the sun set, we switched the Bronco into Sand Mode for one last time and cruised along the sandy stretches of the Atlantic coastline as we reflected on our journey.

Nothing about the TransAmerica Trail is efficient. But that’s what makes it so special.

It winds and meanders across dramatic landscapes, taking you to places that most people rarely go.

It tests you and shows you what you’re really capable of, even if you didn’t quite realize it before.

And it reminds you that our country is incredibly big and incredibly beautiful, with so many unbeaten paths to take, as long as you have the right vehicle to get you there.

As we were planning our trek, we kept wishing we had a resource like Street View to get a sense of what it was like out on the trail. More than 5,900 miles later, we’re proud that the imagery captured on our adventure is now a tool that can help drivers of all experience levels preview trails and feel more confident planning off-road trips of their own.

Alexis Beck is media marketing manager at Ford Motor Company.