A magnificent 13 year feat

Adventurer Finishes 13-Year Odyssey
AP
Posted: 2007-10-06 22:08:24
Filed Under: Weird News, World News

LONDON (Oct. 6) – He was hit by a car in Colorado, attacked by a crocodile in Australia, detained as a suspected spy in Egypt and survived illness and periods of despair.

On Saturday, British adventurer Jason Lewis finally came home, completing a 13-year, 46,000-mile human-powered circumnavigation of the globe.

The 40-year-old carried his 26-foot yellow pedal craft the last few miles up the River Thames, pushing it across the Meridian Line at Greenwich, where his expedition began in 1994.

“I’m overwhelmed,” Lewis told Sky News television after arriving. He struggled for words as he described his feelings at the close of an odyssey that took him around the globe, powered only by his arms and legs – on a bicycle, a pedal boat, a kayak and inline skates.

“It’s been my life, for 13 years, I’ve put everything into this,” he said. “To be honest I didn’t know it was going to happen. There were many times in the trip where it should have failed.”

Lewis was recruited by fellow adventurer Steve Smith, who first dreamed up the idea of going around the world using only human power in 1991. The pair had little experience at sea, but Lewis thought the prospect of hiking and biking across the world was “wildly romantic.”

“The three and a half years the expedition was projected to take sounded like an acceptable amount of time to rejuvenate from the wearisome London scene without totally going AWOL,” Lewis wrote on the expedition’s Web site.

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