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First woman to travel to all 196 countries, does so in record 18 months and 26 days

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E

ElectricBlanketFire

Member
Sheesh. I've only been to Canada and Mexico.

CNN said:
Over the past year and a half, American traveler Cassie De Pecol has visited every country in the world, and the greetings she received weren't always gracious. She had set out to promote peace in her own small way, by meeting people from every country in the world -- and she did so at a record pace.

Traveling to all the world's 196 sovereign nations in 18 months and 26 days, De Pecol made the trip in less than half the time it took the previous Guinness World Record holder.

De Pecol, who majored in environmental studies in college, said she felt she couldn't travel the world without having a larger purpose. She embarked on her world tour in July 2015, promoting sustainable tourism everywhere she went as an ambassador for the International Institute of Peace Through Tourism.

The nonprofit was founded in 1986, the United Nation's "Year of Peace," to promote cultural understanding after terrorist incidents sparked tensions between Eastern and Western countries.

Over the course of her trip, she met with mayors and ministers of tourism, presenting them with the institute's "Declaration of Peace." SKAL International, an association of tourism professionals with chapters all over the world, considered her a peace ambassador and helped De Pecol arrange meetings with dignitaries in more than 50 countries.

In total, De Pecol budgeted $198,000 to get herself around the world.

De Pecol was 23 years old when she began planning her journey, and in the beginning she had no funding. During the year and a half that she spent planning her trip, she says she saved $10,000 by babysitting, then went about acquiring sponsors.
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J

Jazzem

Member
Bloody hell, good on her! As someone who finds travelling to one country and back exhausting, that's somewhat dizzying to envision :p
 
S

Skellig Gra

Member
Atomic Playboy said:
She funded herself through babysitting and getting sponsors; that doesn't scream "wealthy" to me.
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She was babysitting at 23 years old and made 10k. She spent a year and a half planning her trip without a job. That doesn't sound like a poor person. A poor person doesn't even consider the option of traveling to every country in the world. Don't get me wrong, I think her attempt to promote peace and all that is great but let's view it through the proper lens.
 
G

gutshot

Member
Atomic Playboy said:
She funded herself through babysitting and getting sponsors; that doesn't scream "wealthy" to me.
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True. But certainly being a young, white, attractive woman helps in getting sponsors. Definitely some privilege involved, but I still think it is admirable of her to use the trip to promote peace and goodwill between different nations.
 
F

flintstryker

Banned
Hollywood Duo said:
She was babysitting at 23 years old and made 10k. She spent a year and a half planning her trip without a job. That doesn't sound like a poor person. A poor person doesn't even consider the option of traveling to every country in the world. Don't get me wrong, I think her attempt to promote peace and all that is great but let's view it through the proper lens.
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Not being rich doesn't mean you're poor you know, also its not as expensive to travel as some people seem to think
 
S

Skellig Gra

Member
flintstryker said:
Not being rich doesn't mean you're poor you know, also its not as expensive to travel as some people seem to think
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I travel a lot so I know its expensive to travel to every country in the world for over 18 months. The article even says her budget was $200k, which I'm guessing she exceeded.
 
Chittagong

Chittagong

Gold Member
1478738547734.jpg


10392262_1522820328025692_7264072207708834935_n-1-670x388.jpg


Cassie-De-Pecol-725866.jpg


3084768_cassie-de-pecol-cesta-kolem-sveta-cestovani-svetovy-rekord-pribeh-v2.jpg
 
A

Atomic Playboy

Member
Hollywood Duo said:
She was babysitting at 23 years old and made 10k. She spent a year and a half planning her trip without a job. That doesn't sound like a poor person. A poor person doesn't even consider the option of traveling to every country in the world. Don't get me wrong, I think her attempt to promote peace and all that is great but let's view it through the proper lens.
Click to expand...

Hold on. I objected because people specifically said "rich." There's a wide gulf between "rich" and "not poor." I have a friend who does this on a smaller scale; she takes a job somewhere in America (usually locally, but the last couple summers she's gone up to Alaska) and works her ass off for 4 months or so, saves every dime, and then travels abroad and works in some foreign country for 6 months or so. She's not rich, she doesn't come from a background of wealth, and the jobs she takes are usually not what we'd equate with wealth; working in hostels or cooking or whatnot. But she's determined and she's good about saving up her money so she can spend it on what she's passionate about; seeing other parts of the world. Doing this she's been to most of Europe, a handful of countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, all completely self-financed. It helps to not have any other responsibilities, obviously, but people act like travel is something that only the wealthy get to do, and that's balderdash. Traveling is not just first class tickets and 4-star hotels, and it's not just lying around on a beach doing nothing. If you want that travel experience, yeah, you need a shitload of money. That doesn't sound like what the girl in the article was doing.

Also, how are you going to say she made $10,000 babysitting and then turn around and say she didn't have a job? Babysitting is a job. And it's not a job that typically pays $100 an hour, so she was probably doing a lot of it to save $10,000.
 
F

flintstryker

Banned
Atomic Playboy said:
Hold on. I objected because people specifically said "rich." There's a wide gulf between "rich" and "not poor." I have a friend who does this on a smaller scale; she takes a job somewhere in America (usually locally, but the last couple summers she's gone up to Alaska) and works her ass off for 4 months or so, saves every dime, and then travels abroad and works in some foreign country for 6 months or so. She's not rich, she doesn't come from a background of wealth, and the jobs she takes are usually not what we'd equate with wealth; working in hostels or cooking or whatnot. But she's determined and she's good about saving up her money so she can spend it on what she's passionate about; seeing other parts of the world. Doing this she's been to most of Europe, a handful of countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, all completely self-financed. It helps to not have any other responsibilities, obviously, but people act like travel is something that only the wealthy get to do, and that's balderdash. Traveling is not just first class tickets and 4-star hotels, and it's not just lying around on a beach doing nothing. If you want that travel experience, yeah, you need a shitload of money. That doesn't sound like what the girl in the article was doing.

Also, how are you going to say she made $10,000 babysitting and then turn around and say she didn't have a job? Babysitting is a job. And it's not a job that typically pays $100 an hour, so she was probably doing a lot of it to save $10,000.
Click to expand...

Perfectly stated, the impression at lot of people seem to have of traveling is someone lazing around on a beach somewhere at an all inclusive hotel as if that's the only way to travel.
 
S

Skellig Gra

Member
Atomic Playboy said:
Hold on. I objected because people specifically said "rich." There's a wide gulf between "rich" and "not poor." I have a friend who does this on a smaller scale; she takes a job somewhere in America (usually locally, but the last couple summers she's gone up to Alaska) and works her ass off for 4 months or so, saves every dime, and then travels abroad and works in some foreign country for 6 months or so. She's not rich, she doesn't come from a background of wealth, and the jobs she takes are usually not what we'd equate with wealth; working in hostels or cooking or whatnot. But she's determined and she's good about saving up her money so she can spend it on what she's passionate about; seeing other parts of the world. Doing this she's been to most of Europe, a handful of countries in Africa, Southeast Asia and South America, all completely self-financed. It helps to not have any other responsibilities, obviously, but people act like travel is something that only the wealthy get to do, and that's balderdash. Traveling is not just first class tickets and 4-star hotels, and it's not just lying around on a beach doing nothing. If you want that travel experience, yeah, you need a shitload of money. That doesn't sound like what the girl in the article was doing.

Also, how are you going to say she made $10,000 babysitting and then turn around and say she didn't have a job? Babysitting is a job. And it's not a job that typically pays $100 an hour, so she was probably doing a lot of it to save $10,000.
Click to expand...

We're getting way off topic here. She is lucky to have had such an amazing experience and hopefully she actually made a difference with her attempt to promote peace/etc.
 
C

CSJ

Member
Fuck, I have £10k saved up from not having to pay rent after 28months, but I still have bills and other things to pay. Where can I go about getting sponsors to pay 95% of the rest of my dreams? :(
It's all emergency money, I literally have no want to spend it but I've always wanted to get a private pilots license, it would be immature of me to spend it like that.

Very jealous of course, but lets not make it out like it took much effort past getting the money to do it, money speaks, money is the world.
 
G

Glix

Member
CSJ said:
Fuck, I have £10k saved up from not having to pay rent after 28months, but I still have bills and other things to pay. Where can I go about getting sponsors to pay 95% of the rest of my dreams? :(
It's all emergency money, I literally have no want to spend it but I've always wanted to get a private pilots license, it would be immature of me to spend it like that.

Very jealous of course, but lets not make it out like it took much effort past getting the money to do it, money speaks, money is the world.
Click to expand...

Have you tried? If you make a good pitch, the internet is very generous.
 
V

Vicetrailia

Banned
Well obviously she's very privileged.

But I wonder what she'll do now that she's done. Doesn't seem like the type to lock down and grind a 9-5 after doing these things at her young age. Perhaps start a traveling doc show or something.
 
P

perfectchaos007

Member
I feel like in a few years the US Passport won't get you into half of these countries. Usually you need a Canadian passport just to get into North Korea.
 
T

Tagyhag

Member
Very cool, while I'm admittedly a lazy person. This is something that I would LOVE to do. She had a great motive as well.
 
S

SuperBanana

Banned
That would require an insane amount of planning. I've traveled to I think 30 or so and some of those were hard enough.

How did she get in Syria? She'd have had to pay off someone for that. You can get to Iraq but no idea beyond that. I'm assuming Saudi Arabia she got a transit visa.
 
Chittagong

Chittagong

Gold Member
ssolitare said:
Well obviously she's very privileged.

But I wonder what she'll do now that she's done. Doesn't seem like the type to lock down and grind a 9-5 after doing these things at her young age. Perhaps start a traveling doc show or something.
Click to expand...


There is a precedent, Graham Hughes and The Odyssey Exhibition. Dude seemed to burn out pretty hard, he didn't complete more than third of his YouTube series, took a break, entered a competition to win a remote island and relocated there. He was more hardcore though, hitchhiking fishing boats and such. Awesome guy:

https://www.theodysseyexpedition.com
https://grahamdavidhughes.com


Another one is Niall Doherty. He eventually got fed up to constantly being on the road and returned to Europe to pursue his previous web design gigs:

http://ndoherty.com
 
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