My brother's house has unprotected running from meter to ground, and then across under the 2-car garage pad to the basement, then about 1 foot down to the MCB panel.
That is still "outside" as far as the NEC is concerned. In fact we got around an unprotected SE to a fire pump controller once by forming up a trough, dropping a 2" rigid conduit in it and pouring it solid with concrete so it was 2" in from all directions.
