WORDS: Scout Motors IMAGES: WILDSAM & Scout Motors
ong before GPS started optimizing every journey, road trips were shaped by instinct and the rustle of a paper map. Maybe you’d take the slower road, because someone told you there was a good diner out there. Or because a battered old sign hinted at something worth seeing.
In that spirit, we’ve created a travel companion with our friends at Wildsam.® Titled, Scout The America Others Pass By, this book celebrates craftsmanship, curiosity, and the joys of taking the long way around.
If the title rings a bell, that’s because it was used in 1970s ads for Scout® vehicles. We’ve always been focused on a more adventurous, less hurried kind of travel. The North American Trail Guide glovebox companion, published by International™ Scout in 1979 as a test-drive promotion, is a testament to that.
Scout The America Others Pass By is created in the same spirit. Wildsam collected some of their best routes and destinations into this new guidebook fit for every adventurous soul.
That’s why every reservation holder* for a Scout Traveler™ SUV or Scout Terra™ truck will receive a copy of Scout The America Others Pass By.
There are old roadside joints, forgotten attractions, and detours that only seem to appear when you’re not in a hurry.
Each section is filled with local legends, hand-drawn illustrations, food stops, public lands and backroads worth taking slowly. It feels like an invitation, and a quiet thank-you to the people already waiting to begin their own Scout vehicle stories.
You’ll find stories from places like the Southern Delta, the Gulf Coast, the Catskills, and the high desert. There are old roadside joints, forgotten attractions, and detours that only seem to appear when you’re not in a hurry. It’s a reminder that the best memories are usually found in the places you never planned to stop.
Dip into the section about the Pacific Coast and you’ll find yourself drifting through Astoria and the Olympic Peninsula, where the storm-battered coastline is dotted with fishing towns. Where old-growth forests of deepest green feel strangely detached from modern America.
Heading into the interior, the book follows mountain roads through the San Juans, past old hotels and small-town breweries that feel tied to an earlier era of American road travel.
Out east, the Hudson Valley and Catskills become a landscape of river towns, old bookstores, and cool summer air. Places shaped as much by writers and musicians as the geography itself.
What connects all these locations is less about geography and more about the urge to wander. A neon-lit diner worth pulling over for, or a backcountry lodge at the end of a long highway. A tucked-away campsite you only hear about from locals. America is still full of places that don’t appear on itineraries. You just have to leave enough room in the journey to find them.
That idea sits at the heart of both Wildsam and Scout Motors. Before algorithms started telling us the fastest way to get somewhere, road trips left more room for curiosity: meeting new people and finding stories you couldn’t have planned in advance.
Maybe that’s why a physical book like this still matters, with dog-eared pages and notes scrawled in the margins. And when your Scout Traveler or Scout Terra arrives, Scout The America Others Pass By will end up where all good road-trip companions belong: somewhere in the glove box, waiting for the next detour.
If this guide sends you somewhere new, we’d love to see it. Visit a place from the book — or somewhere it inspires — and share a photo using #ScoutTheAmericaOthersPassBy.
*Scout The America Others Pass By was distributed to reservation holders who provided a physical mailing address upon request. Hit the link below to ensure we have your address on file or make a reservation to secure your spot in line!
