There's a pretty big difference between ICMP and UDP/TCP pings: UDP and TCP can and most likely will be load-balanced across multiple different links, as the 4-

There's a pretty big difference between ICMP and UDP/TCP pings: UDP and TCP can and most likely will be load-balanced across multiple different links, as the 4-tuples change with every new packet. ICMP almost never is, so you only see a single route where there may be tens. If the network you're trying to debug is a) IPv4-only and b) not too wide, you may also find some utility in ping -R, which turns on the oft-forgotten but rarely firewalled IPv4 Record Route option, and that way you may get visibility into at least one of the return routes as well. Unfortunately, the IPv4 header can only record up to 9 hops, so it's less useful over the internet.