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- Hits: 1035
- Description: Tom Turcich became the tenth person on record to walk around the world. Motivated by the death of two close friends in his teenage years, he spent eight years saving and planning before setting out on 2 April 2015. His route covered South America, Antarctica, Europe, North Africa, Central Asia and North America, crossing six continents and 38 countries in seven years. Approximately five months into the journey, he adopted a rescue puppy from an Austin, Texas shelter, naming her Savannah; she walked with him for the remainder of the trip, becoming the first dog to circumnavigate the world on foot. The journey was interrupted by a serious illness in Peru and by the COVID-19 pandemic, which stranded him in Azerbaijan. He was robbed at knifepoint in Panama and held at gunpoint in Turkey. On 21 May 2022 he completed the walk, returning to Haddon Township. In total he covered approximately 45,000 km (28,000 miles)
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: The World Walk
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: USA
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: On foot, A piedi, À pied
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://www.tomturcich.com
- Multimedia: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheWorldWalk
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Turcich, Tom. The World Walk: 7 Years, 28,000 Miles, 6 Continents: A Grand Meditation One Step at a Time. Skyhorse Publishing, 2024.
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- Hits: 1135
- Description: Serge Girard is a French ultramarathon runner. Prior to his world circumnavigation he set several continental running records: USA Los Angeles - New York City, 4,597 km in 52 days (1997); Australia Perth - Sydney, 3,755 km in 46 days (1999); South America Lima - Rio de Janeiro, 5,235 km in 73 days (2001); Africa Dakar - Cairo, 8,295 km in 123 days (2003-2004); Eurasia Paris - Shanghai, 11,538 km in 161 days (2005-2006). Between 2016 and 8 April 2017 he completed a solo running circumnavigation of the world covering 26,245 km across five continents and 18 countries in 434 days - without a single rest day - setting the current men's world record certified by the World Runners Association (WRA)
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: -
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: France, Francia
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: On foot, A piedi, À pied
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://sergegirard.com
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q3479331
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- Hits: 1135
- Description: Marie Leautey is a French ultrarunner and former international CFO based in Greece. Between 2019 and 1 September 2022 she completed a running circumnavigation of the world across four continents and 21 countries, covering 28,249 km (17,500 miles) - the equivalent of 680 marathons - in 825 days, running approximately one marathon per day six days a week at an average speed of 9.2 km/h. Her route covered Europe (15,420 km), North America (5,383 km), South America (3,002 km) and Australia (4,550 km), concluding on the steps of the Sydney Opera House. She crossed the Pyrenees, the Alps, the Ardennes, the Apennines, the Dinaric Alps, the Rockies, the Appalachians, the Andes and the Nullarbor Desert. She pushed a 29 kg pram throughout, using a motorhome support only in the Andes and Australia. The journey was self-financed and completed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Certified by the World Runners Association (WRA), she became the second woman and seventh person overall to complete a running circumnavigation, and the fastest woman to do so. She dedicates her achievement to the NGO Women for Women International. She has recounted the journey in her book Lootie's World Run (2025)
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: Lootie
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: France, Francia
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: On foot, A piedi, À pied
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://lootie-run.com/
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Leautey, Marie. Lootie's World Run: The Extraordinary True Story of the Fastest Woman to Have Run Around the World. Mascot Books, 2025.
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- Hits: 1154
- Description: Angela Maxwell is an American adventurer, speaker and expedition organiser based in Bend, Oregon. On 2 May 2014, having saved $12,000 and with no prior long-distance hiking experience, she departed Bend pulling a three-wheeled cart she named "Athena" and began a solo pedestrian circumnavigation of the world. Her route covered Australia, Vietnam, Mongolia, Central Asia, the Middle East, Europe and the United States, traversing four continents and 14 countries. In Mongolia in 2015, she was sexually assaulted in her tent; she continued walking the following day and subsequently became an advocate for women's safety in travel, raising over $20,000 for Her Future Coalition. Both her father and stepfather died during the journey. She completed her walk in December 2020, covering approximately 32,000 km (20,000 miles) in six and a half years. In 2024 she joined explorer Karl Bushby for a 1,600 km (1,000 miles) crossing of the Kyzylkum Desert from Bukhara, Uzbekistan, to the Caspian Sea, where the two, along with two professional Azerbaijani swimmers, became the first people to swim across the Caspian Sea unsupported
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: She Walks the Earth
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: USA
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: 1981-
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: On foot, A piedi, À pied
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://www.shewalkstheearth.com
- Multimedia: https://www.youtube.com/@PadmaMaxwell
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- Hits: 1309
- Description: Olabisi Ajala was a Nigerian journalist, travel writer, actor and adventurer. After studying pre-medicine at the University of Chicago and embarking on a 2,280-mile bicycle tour from Chicago to Los Angeles in 1952 - during which he lectured on Africa in traditional Nigerian dress - he was deported from the United States to the United Kingdom, where he conceived his world tour. On 27 April 1957, aged 26, he departed London on a Vespa scooter on a journey he named "This Safari", intending to cover 40 countries. Over six years he visited 87 countries across Asia, Africa, Oceania and Europe, meeting world leaders including Jawaharlal Nehru, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Nikita Khrushchev, the Shah of Iran, Golda Meir and Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. His most dramatic moment came at the Mandelbaum Gate between Jordan and Israel, where Jordanian guards fired at him as he accelerated through the crossing, a bullet bursting his rear tyre. He financed the journey by selling travel writing to newspapers and magazines across West Africa. He returned to Nigeria, where he became a celebrated socialite and was immortalised in the 1972 album Board Members by jùjú musician Ebenezer Obey - the chorus "Ajala travel all over the world" made his name synonymous with wanderlust in Nigerian culture. Despite his fame, he died in poverty in Lagos on 2 February 1999. His memoir An African Abroad was published in 1963 and republished in 2022
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: Ajala the Traveller, Travel Ajala
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: Nigeria
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: 1934-1999
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: Vespa
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olabisi_Ajala
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q96187854
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Ajala, Olabisi. An African Abroad. London: Jarrolds, 1963.
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- Hits: 1046
- Description: In the mid-1950s, departing from Genoa on a Vespa - initially a three-wheeled model, which he exchanged for a solo scooter on reaching Iran - he completed a 15-month round-the-world journey covering 59,500 km (37,000 miles) in total, of which 33,800 km (21,000 miles) were ridden on the scooter. His route went through Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Ceylon, before he boarded a ship to Australia and then crossed the United States to New York. The journey was sponsored in part by Piaggio and several other companies. He recounted it in Poet on a Scooter, published by Dial Press in 1958
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: Jean de Ballard, Rollin Coss, H.R. Rose
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: USA
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: Vespa
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.$b776143
- Wikidata: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q94407284
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Roskolenko, Harry. Poet on a Scooter. New York: Dial Press, 1958.
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- Hits: 1052
- Description: Between 1957 and 1964 he completed two round-the-world motorcycle journeys, visiting approximately 100 countries across four continents and meeting around 40 heads of state, kings and political leaders, carrying greetings from Syrian youth. His first journey covered Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, then the USSR, Poland, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, West and East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Austria, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, returning to Syria. His second journey covered Turkey, Bulgaria, Greece, Yugoslavia, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, France and England, then Canada, the United States, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and Brazil, before returning via the United Kingdom, Senegal and across Africa to Syria. In total he covered approximately 153,000 km. He wrote ten books in Arabic about his travels, including East Meets West on a Motorcycle (1959) and Around the World by Motorcycle: 153,000 km in 7 Years Between 64 Capitals of the World (1982)
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: -
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: Syria, Siria, Syrie
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: Motorbike, Motocicletta, Moto
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: http://www.berndtesch.de
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- Hits: 1091
- Description: Günther Markert was a German long-distance traveller and photographer. Between 22 February 1954 and 8 May 1955 he completed a round-the-world journey on a modified Kreidler R50 scooter, covering approximately 50,000 km (31,000 miles) through 33 countries across four continents. His route went from Germany through Italy, Egypt, Sudan, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, India, Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, Japan, the United States, Mexico and Morocco, returning to Berlin. During the journey he set an altitude record for Kreidler at 4,600 metres on the slopes of Popocatépetl, the second-highest mountain in Mexico. He was a photographer throughout the journey and documented it with numerous photographs. The original Kreidler R50 used on the journey is on display at the Technikmuseum Sinsheim. He recounted his journey in Die Welt war meine Strasse ("The World Was My Road")
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: -
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: Germany, Germania, Allemagne
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: Moped, Motorino, Cyclomoteur
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://www.zweirad-museum.de
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Markert, Günther. Die Welt war meine Strasse: eine abenteuerliche Rollerfahrt um die Erde. Bertelsmann, 1958. "Günther Markert und Kreidler R50." Schwalbennest Forum.
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- Hits: 1060
- Description: Walter Küpper was a German long-distance moped traveller. Inspired by a book about round-the-world motorcycle riders, he departed in 1959 on a 1.2 hp, three-speed Miele moped - which he had already tested the previous year on a holiday ride to Turkey - and completed a round-the-world journey over 902 days, returning in 1962. His route covered Europe, Turkey, Persia, India, Malaya and Australia. In Japan, media interest in his story had grown to such a degree that press were waiting for him at the dockside, and the Bridgestone Motorcycle Company donated a new moped for the final leg across the United States and back to Europe. In the United States, by contrast, his journey attracted no attention. He covered approximately 72,000 km (45,000 miles) in total and recorded five hours of Super-8 cine film during the journey. He recounted his experiences in Tausend Tage Abenteuer ("One Thousand Days of Adventure"), published in 1966
- Alias-Pseudonimo-Pseudonyme: -
- Nationality-Nazionalità-Nationalité: Germany, Germania, Allemagne
- Birth/death-Nascita/morte-Naissance/mort: -
- Means of transport-Mezzo di trasporto-Moyen de transport: Moped, Motorino, Cyclomoteur
- Geographical description-Riferimento geografico-Référence géographique: Around the World, Giro del mondo, Tour du monde
- Internet: https://www.berndtesch.de
- Additional references-Riferimenti complementari-Références complémentaires: Küpper, Walter. Tausend Tage Abenteuer. Munich: F. Schneider, 1966.