Father and son from Virginia Beach set out to visit every U.S. National Park

By Beverly Kidd

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    VIRGINIA BEACH, Virginia (WTKR) — Virginia Beach residents Bill and Cole Dailey have a scrapbook of adventures chronicling their quest to visit every national park in the United States.

“Back in 2019, me and my dad did a cross-country train trip. During that train trip… we went through 26 states,” said Billy Dailey.

It was in April of 2021 when the father-son duo set out on their journey. They were inspired by an Ohio grandmother and her grandson who were doing it.

“I reached out to Brad and asked them a lot of questions about how do you get to this place like the Dry Tortugas are out on an island 70 miles off the coast of the Florida Keys,” said the elder Dailey.

So far, they’ve been to 37 of the 63 national parks.

“Yellowstone is by far one of my favorite national parks I’ve ever been to. There’s so much nature, there’s bison everywhere, there’s wildlife everywhere. We did see a moose and we only saw one pronghorn.—[which is] kind of like a gazelle but has a white coat,” said Cole.

Their park travels have earned them quite an online following. Their Instagram, @our._excellent._adventures, has more than 13,000 followers.

“Some of our friends say on social media it’s so cool for them to see all these places that most adults don’t get to see, but they’re able to see it through our eyes, someone they know and can relate to,” said Bill.

The adventure has earned the 15-year-old Ocean Lakes student Junior Ranger badges from each park.

Recently, the father-son duo entered a contest. They were one of 70,000 entries in the National Park Foundation’s ultimate explorer competition with a grand prize of $10,000.

However, it’s not money or online attention that motivates Billy to carve out so much time for excellent adventures.

“My childhood wasn’t great growing up and I never want Cole to feel like I felt growing up. The things I do with Cole are things I wish my father would’ve done with me,” said Bill.

But not all of their trips are Instagram worthy. Even the best-laid plans go sideways, like the trip to Everglades National Park in Florida.

”We like to camp. We arrived at the campground at the southernmost tip of Florida and the campground is really big. We wondered why we were the only ones there. All of a sudden, we hear the buzzing. I turn on the light, and the entire tent was caked with mosquitoes,” said Bill.

They place fifth in the competition, but they didn’t seem disappointed. After all, it’s the memories they will share for a lifetime that make this dynamic traveling duo Positively Hampton Roads.

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