British Adventurer Ends 28-Year Walk Around the World

Karl Bushby is approaching the end of a 28-year walk around the world, with his mother’s home in Hull, England, about 30 miles away. The 57-year-old British former paratrooper pushed a cart loaded with camping gear along a country road near Market Rasen on Wednesday.

Bushby began the journey on November 1, 1998, at the tip of South America when he was just under 30 years old. He has since walked 31,000 miles, or 50,000 kilometers, across four continents and through 30 foreign countries.

“My purpose and reason for living is about to end.”

The trek included shifting ice over the Bering Strait, swims across the Caspian Sea and English Channel, and passage through jungle, rainforest, desert, and frozen tundra. He also faced a polar bear standoff, crocodile-infested waters in Colombia, a mob attack in Peru, and a helicopter rescue from a sea ice floe.

Bureaucracy slowed the journey far more than nature. What was expected to take 12 years stretched to 28, totaling more than 10,220 days and roughly 75 million steps.

Bushby said his purpose and reason for living is about to end, and he is anxious about blending back into society. He compared himself to Odysseus, quipping that the Greek hero was a bit of an amateur.