Around the World in 80 Ways

Around the World in 80 Ways

It’s been nearly 150 years since Jules Verne’s beloved novel Around the World in Eighty Days made its debut. The fictional story tells the tale of a single and very wealthy English gentleman named Phileas Fogg who makes a $2.5 million wager that he can make his way around the world in 80 days, thanks in part to the recent addition of a new railway in India. Without spoiling the ending for those who haven’t read the story, there’s plenty of globetrotting, romance, and even an arrest. To see if Fogg ends up winning his bet, you’ll just have to read the story.

Thankfully, it certainly doesn’t need to take you 80 days to circumnavigate the globe with today’s modern advancements in transportation. You can start a round the world trip from London on Monday and be back in time for the weekend if you simply rely on planes. Should you choose to drive the land-based legs of the journey, you will still get around the world in about a quarter of the time Fogg was attempting to achieve. You may not need to be as wealthy as Phileas Fogg to travel the world these days, but you may have to start gathering some cash if you want to travel in style.

Check out this interactive guide which details how long it will take you to get around the world using various modes of transportation.

Although Phileas Fogg may have been a fictional character, he is based off the very real-life American adventurer and early day travel writer William Perry Fogg. One could say William was one of our very first travel bloggers.

While the interactive guide above may reveal how long it takes to travel around the world using traditional modes of transport, many of today’s travelers are looking for crazier ways to see the world. While we won’t bore you with actually listing 80 different modes of transport that can be found around the world, we have selected a few of the most adventurous ways to roam the planet.

Airboat Ride in the Everglades

There’s really only one way to get across the shallow waters and muddy swamps of Southern Florida’s Everglades. You may need to pop in some earplugs before you start heading off in search of alligators and Florida panthers, as airboats can be quite noisy. These flat-bottomed boats are powered by a large propeller that is placed off the back of the boat and it creates one hell of a wake. Reaching fast speeds that are sure to have you feeling a powerful breeze, there’s no need to worry about trying to swat mosquitoes from your face.

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Riding on the Back of a Camel

Whether you’re travelling through the Sahara Desert in Morocco or trying to catch the sunset on a beach in Western Australia, choosing to ride a camel seems like a romantic idea. While camel rides may make for some killer Instagram shots, the truth is that these humped beasts don’t provide a very comfortable journey. They also aren’t exactly the most beautifully sounding creatures and you of course may have to deal with a bit of spit every now and then. Riding camels does, however, allow you to travel through more remote destinations where roads are absent, and they can probably carry more than you can fit in the trunk of your car.

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Dog Sledding Through the Snow

Nothing beats travelling with man’s, or women’s, best friend, especially when the dogs literally do all the heavy lifting.  While leading a group of sled dogs across Alaska won’t get you places as fast as a snowmobile, the experience is much quieter and keeps you more in tune with nature. Always be sure to pack some snowshoes in case your dogs decide to call it quits and refuse to pull you any longer, although a bribe of a few dog biscuits usually will get them back on their feet again. Should you be allergic to dogs, try being led on a sleigh by reindeer. It works for Santa and he manages to make it all the way around the world in a single night. Even our finest passenger planes can’t manage that speed.

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Hot Air Ballooning

If you were wondering how long it would take you to go around the world in a hot air balloon, well it’s been done in 15 days. If you don’t mind sitting in a basket the size of a small closet or surviving on 4 hours of sleep a day, you can attempt the challenge just as Steve Fossett did in 2002.  Fossett managed to become the first person to fly solo around the world nonstop in a balloon. For those feeling less adventurous, a relaxing 2-hour float over the wineries of Tuscany, a herd of elephants in the Serengeti, or the Cappadocia region in Turkey may be a better option.

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Zip-lining Through the Jungle

While we may not have the skills to fly around the world using our own strength, we can feel a bit like a bird by zip-lining through the trees. Channel your inner macaw as you breeze through the Costa Rican jungle much quicker than you could ever hike through the dense vegetation. Of course there are limitations, the most apparent being that ziplines won’t exactly get you very far and don’t seem to yet cross over any oceans. There is, however, a giant nearly 2-mile zip-line in the UAE. Touted as the world’s longest zipline, it allows you to reach speeds of almost 100mph and will take you over the Jebel Jais Mountains.

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Author: Michael Jerrard

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1 Comment

  1. What an Great Post. Very interesting topic of the time and I really thrilled to read this. Keep posting such interesting topics.

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