Premise
A 27-year-old traveler just completed her trip to visit every country in the world! Cassie De Pecol is the first woman to visit every sovereign nation, and the fastest person to visit every world country. A truly impressive feat! EDIT: However, her claims have been disputed as there are several other women who have visited “every nation”, as well. More can be found at RapidTravelChai.
Details and Logistics
De Pecol started in July of 2015, and finished this Feburary 2nd with Yemen, the 196th and final country. This journey was completed in the record speed of 18 months and 26 days, which is less than half of the previous record of three years and three months.
This trip took about 570 days, and at a tally of 196 countries, this means she visited each country for an average of just under three days. Three days per country! That speed and diligence is just crazy.
As ambassador for the International Institute of Peace Through Tourism, she also had plenty of meeting with government tourism officials on a more business-like capacity.
De Pecol highlighted the difficulty of entering several countries. For example:
“There have been cases when I post on my Facebook, ‘Hi I need help getting into Libya’ or ‘I need help getting into Syria,’ and at that point it’s kind of trusting in the unknown, trusting in people”
Numbers to Visit Every Country
Flights: 255
Countries where she planted trees: 50+
Passports Used: 5
Funding
She saved the initial $10,000, and funded the remaining nearly $200,000 through sponsors. Additionally, she provided promotional coverage for eco-hotels, in exchange for lodging. Of course, she also has a website, and drew lots of interest on social media. Many, many Instagram and Facebook followers.
Next Steps
De Pecol is getting certified by Guinness World Records for her travels, and has plenty of interesting activities on the horizon. Having filmed her travels, she hopes to have a documentary soon. De Pecol plans to visit Antarctica as well – because why not?
This powerwoman also has plans for Triathlon, and teaching. As you may expect, it will be a course on securing funding for exactly such a world trip.
Conclusion & Edit
I am simply in awe about the whirlwind schedule and amazing feat that this superwoman has completed. While many of us may not have the resources, time, or wherewithal to complete or even attempt to visit every country, it is good that she does. Perhaps she will motivate me, or you, to go explore. Also, it has spurred a period of self-reflection. As I am the same age, what have I accomplished? It is time for more “living” and “doing” and less of the “being”. We only have a finite amount of time, and we should spend it living and experiencing it to the fullest.
Edit 2/17:
However, her claims have been disputed as there are several other women who have visited “every nation”, as well. More can be found at RapidTravelChai. I would highly recommend checking there if you want to know more – there are several great resources helping to break down the clarification of “every nation” and more logistical questions. De Pecol has replied via twitter – however she has also deleted her tweets. Fake news is very prevalent in today’s media, and it was on me to do more research/due diligence. The CNN article on the Travel&Leisure article was based had no mention of these other facets, but Chai has done an excellent job providing more background.
Featured Image from Pixabay of a beautiful cottage on a beach. Original article here.
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“De Pecol saved $10,000 in babysitting money. She acquired the rest of her $198,000 budget through sponsors”
Sooooo, not so much the babysitting money.
Completely agree. I’d like to learn more about the sponsorship aspect, as that sounds very lucrative and amazing.
I can’t believe that you are on Boardingarea. You repeat old bogus crap that has already been debunked by other Boardingarea blogs.
It seems some of her claims are not entirely true or disputable at best
http://rapidtravelchai.boardingarea.com/2017/02/15/women-traveled-every-country-world/
Interesting – this makes a lot of sense as I was also surprised she was the first. I will link to this article in mine – lots of hesitations there. Also her disjointed twitter responses don’t seem very honest. Thanks for reading & Commenting!
What a worthless accomplishment. She probably spend more time traveling than actually on the ground in a country.
Absolutely – says she spent between 2-5 days in each country, not nearly enough to enjoy/appreciate/explore it to a satisfactory amount. However there are disputes of her claims, posted on boarding area – http://rapidtravelchai.boardingarea.com/2017/02/15/women-traveled-every-country-world/
I already was a bit confused – first woman, really? but reading this made me question even more.