Year
1998
At home, his son is still a child.
The world turns without you.
The route, 1998–2026
Ten stretches, one unbroken line. Tap a stretch for the facts and the sources.
How long does it take to walk around the world?
The theory
The Earth's equator is about 24,901 miles. At a steady 3 mph, walking non-stop with no rest, no border and no ocean, it would take roughly 346 days.
The reality
Karl Bushby took 28 years. He said the actual walking was about 15 years — the rest was visas, logistics and the pandemic. On this walk, time is the enemy, not distance.
Questions people ask
Which parts are real?
The game is a dramatisation, but every date, distance and place below is drawn from public reporting.
- Total distance: 31,000 miles (≈ 50,000 km), the Reuters / AP figure. Some reports say 36,000 miles / 58,000 km.
- Countries crossed: 29–30 (BBC/ITV say 29, AP says 30).
- Steps: 75,000,000 — an estimate from the official site, not a count.
- Walked 1 Nov 1998 to 2 Nov 2026 — 10,299 days, of which about 15 years were actual walking.
Sources
BBC and AP are cited for figures (country count, crowd size) by name only, to avoid linking stale addresses. Route distances in the game are approximations.