Graham Hughes, a regular man from Liverpool, is the first person to travel to all 201 countries in the world — without using a plane. He used various means of transport, including trains, taxis, and buses, and his two feet, to travel a total of 160,000 miles in a span of 1,426 days.
Alamy Stock Photo by Bruce Tanner
He has had a checkered experience and incredible stories, such as crossing the ocean in a leaky boat to Cape Verde and being detained for about a week in Congo on being suspected as a “spy”. He was also arrested for trying to “sneak” into Russia. He traveled across the borders of all hundred and ninety-three member states of the UN, Vatican City, Taiwan, Palestine, Kosovo, Western Sahara, and four ethnic groups in the United Kingdom — all without flying.
Graham, who raised money for the charity Water Aid and recorded the documentary campaign, has achieved a world record of “Most Visited Lands in One Year by Subsidiary Transportation”. It was even approved by Guinness World Records! While all the transportation had to be done with wheels, hooves, or solid rubber saliva, he made this long journey, especially by boarding cargo ships.
Alamy Stock Photo by GeoPic
Some interesting highlights of his journey include striking a friendship with an orangutan in Borneo, dancing with the Highlanders of Papua New Guinea, meeting with the Prime Minister of Tuvalu, and traveling to Kenya in an 18-wheeled truck. He says there are low points in a trip like “sitting at a bus station in Cambodia for the first hour in the morning or riding in a bad truck on bad roads” when he thinks: “Why am I doing this?” He called his entire expedition the Odyssey Expedition, and now holds the Guinness World Record for “A Trip to 133 Countries in One Year on a Planned Tour”. He has been awarded several times for his remarkable feat and has become a living legend to all travel buffs and adventure seekers around the world.
