This season visited twelve states, one federal district, and three additional countries and traveled over 11,000 miles (18,000 km) during eleven legs.

This season placed much less emphasis on international travel as numerous legs were contained within the continental United States, and all locations were in North America, with Panama and Costa Rica visited for the first time.

[5] This season featured a visit to New Orleans in the fourth and fifth legs, where filming occurred about a month before Hurricane Katrina struck the region.

A special message was inserted at the beginning of the episodes, including one spoken by Phil Keoghan, dedicating them to the victims and to those helping with the recovery.

Hurricane Katrina wiped out the Schroeders' home and most of their possessions, and after staying with the Rogerses for about two weeks, they were able to find more permanent housing in Baton Rouge, and most of the other teams from this season chipped in to help the family.

[6] According to an interview with Wally Bransen on RFF Radio, producers had originally planned a leg in Belize, but had to cancel it due to Hurricane Emily.

The main issues were the lack of international travel and watered-down challenges tailored to families, and the expanded cast also made it more difficult to develop individual story lines.

Dalton Ross of Entertainment Weekly commented that "Half the fun of The Amazing Race has always been watching the inter- and intra-couple bickering that goes with being chronically late and lost in a foreign land.

[13] Robert Bianco of USA Today shared similar opinions, adding that "the idea of being trapped in the back seat for a forced cross-country family drive comes closer to a nightmare relived than a dream come true.

In hindsight, the production team has admitted that the concept of a Family Edition "looked good on paper" but failed in execution, since child racers limited foreign travel for that season.