Filenews 3 January 2026
When Carl Busby left Hull, England, in 1998, he was 29 years old, had just $500 in his pocket and a single goal: to cross the world on foot, without any transportation assistance.
Twenty-seven years later, he is now in Europe and counting down to complete his unprecedented mission and return home on foot.
His expedition, known as the Goliath Expedition, began in Punta Arenas, Chile, near the southernmost tip of South America.
Since then, he has crossed continents, borders and regimes, with a non-negotiable rule: only walking or swimming – until he reaches his homeland exclusively on foot.
The "simple" rules that became a nightmare
"At first it seemed simple," Bushby tells CNBC. "But when you meet the reality of the world – visas, governments, closed borders – everything becomes terribly complicated."
And yet, despite the delays and twists and turns, walking an average of 30 kilometers a day, he is now approaching the end of a 36,000-mile route.
From the army... on the world map
Raised in a military family, Bushby enlisted in the British Army at the age of 16 and served for about 12 years as a paratrooper. But, as he says, at some point boredom came.
"We were living in one of the most peaceful periods in history. We were waiting to go somewhere and we never went," he emphasizes to CNBC. This is how he began to draw lines on maps – from Europe to Siberia, from the Bering Strait to the Americas, to the southern edge of the Earth.
When he saw the entire route on paper, there was no going back.
Hunger, frost and prison
In his 27 years of journey, Bushby has crossed the dangerous Darien Gap, been detained by Russian authorities, imprisoned in Panama, nearly died of hypothermia in Alaska and swam for 31 days to cross the Caspian Sea.
There were days without food, nights in a tent on the side of the road, moments that relied solely on the kindness of strangers.
"Hunger changes you psychologically. You see food everywhere. You're chasing hallucinations," he says.
The most important lesson
And yet, the hardest part of his journey wasn't the cold, the pain or the exhaustion.
"The hardest thing is to lose relationships, the women you fall in love with. Body pain is easy. Loss is different," he admits.
At the same time, his happiest moments were when he was not alone. "When you're with someone."
Perhaps that is why the biggest lesson of the 27-year-old journey is not about survival, but about people. "People are much friendlier than we think," he says. "In every country, in every culture, strangers fed me, took care of me, without asking for anything."
And he concludes: "This world is ultimately much better than it seems."
