Graham Hughes

Graham David Hughes (born 28 February 1979) was the first person, according to Guinness World Records, to visit all 193 United Nations member states and several other territories across the world without flying.[2] While on his journey he presented the television programme Graham's World on the National Geographic Adventure channel.[3]

This article is about the British adventurer. For other people, see Graham Hughes (disambiguation).

Graham Hughes
Hughes in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, June 2010
Born (1979-02-28) 28 February 1979[1]
Liverpool, England
Known forVisiting all 193 UN member states without flying

Early life

Hughes was born in Liverpool in 1979. He attended Blackmoor Park School and the Liverpool Blue Coat School. He attended the University of Manchester. He moved to Orrell Park and set up a video production company firstly in Dale Street and then in the Baltic Triangle.[4]

The Odyssey Expedition

The Odyssey Expedition was a visit to all of the 193 UN member states. For the United Kingdom, Hughes visited all of the four constituent countries that make up the kingdom and counted the UN member state as four separate countries. Hughes also visited the non-member state of Vatican City, as well as the partially recognised non-member states of Palestine, Western Sahara, Kosovo, and Taiwan, for a total of 201 "countries" without flying. He noted people wonder how he got to countries like North Korea, Iraq and Afghanistan, but claims that "they were the easy ones".[5]

Before embarking on the journey, Hughes contacted Guinness World Records to agree the rules of his journey. The rules were: no flying as part of the journey, no private taxis over long distances (shared "bush" taxis were okay), no hitch-hiking, Hughes could not drive a vehicle or ride a motorbike as part of the journey (Guinness World Records does not permit people to "race" on public roads in private vehicles in order to set or break records), he must set foot on dry land (sailing into territorial waters did not count) and no travelling to far-flung territories and counting them as a visit to the motherland. Private transport was permitted over short distances (such as taking a private taxi across town), private transport was also permitted over water and he was allowed to take a break from the journey for personal reasons so long as he did not fly as part of the journey and he returned to the exact spot from which he left, something he did twice on his journey. It was agreed that the clock would not stop.[6]

Events of the trip included imprisonment in the Republic of the Congo, getting caught sneaking into Russia, and running the blockade into Cuba. He was arrested in Estonia and Cameroon, then he spent jail time in Congo-Brazzaville[7] and Cape Verde.[8]

Guinness World Records were reportedly unhappy with his entry into Russia as it was the only country he entered without passing an official border post.[9] In January 2013 Hughes returned to Russia, this time with a visa.

While on The Odyssey Expedition, Hughes helped raise funds and awareness for the charity WaterAid.[10]

World records

Hughes set a new Guinness World Record by visiting "133 countries in one year by scheduled ground transport"[11][12] during the first year of his four-year journey.

In February 2014, it was announced that Guinness World Records had confirmed Hughes's Odyssey Expedition was "The fastest time to visit all countries by public surface transport" (4 years and 31 days) after an extraordinarily long verification process. Marco Frigatti, Head of Records at Guinness World Records was quoted as saying "I can't remember a more absorbing record to verify in recent years."[13]

Television shows and filmmaking

Hughes's video log of the first year of his expedition was made into an eight-part television series called "Graham's World" or "Lonely Planet's The Odyssey".[14] It was commissioned by the National Geographic Adventure channel, produced by Lonely Planet and distributed by BBC Worldwide.[15]

Travel writing

Hughes's debut travel memoir, "Man of the World: Book One of The Odyssey Expedition", an account of the first year of his journey to every country without flying, was published by ATBOSH Media in October 2017.[16]

YouTube work

Graham has been active on YouTube since Sep 12, 2006 and in the summer of 2013, Hughes's "One Second Every Country" YouTube video went viral,[17] amassing almost one million views in just a few weeks, which led to appearances on BBC News[18] and CBS This Morning[19] as well as articles about his travels on Buzzfeed[20] and Esquire.[21]

Post travel activities

SOS Island

On 12 December 2013, Hughes was declared the winner of SOS Island,[22] a Survivor-like show featuring Les Stroud which relied on social media to promote Samsung products on a desert island setting. The prize was $100,000 towards a future island adventure of his choice.[23] He chose to buy an island in Bocas Del Toro, Panama, from fellow British adventurer Ian Usher. Hughes renamed it "Jinja Island" and lived there off-grid for the best part of three years.[24]

Global Scouse Day

Hughes is the founder of Global Scouse Day, a celebration of "all things Liverpool" held every year in his home town on his birthday.[25]

Anti-Brexit activism

In the wake of the Brexit referendum, Hughes wrote to his local Labour Party MP, Stephen Twigg, threatening to stand against him in an upcoming election if he voted with the Conservative Party to activate Article 50 without any protection for EU citizens living in the UK or British citizens living in the EU (against the wishes of a majority of his constituents). When Theresa May called a snap election in April 2017, Hughes, true to his word, returned to the UK to run against Twigg as an independent candidate.[26] He received 0.7% of the votes, subsequently losing his deposit having not met the 5% threshold.[27][4][28]

Since then, Hughes has been a vocal advocate of remaining in the European Union, leading and emceeing the "People's March For Europe" in September 2017.[29] He stood as a candidate for the Liberal Democrats in the 2018 local government elections for his home ward of Knotty Ash, Liverpool and came third with just over 6% of the vote.

Party political activism

Hughes is a political supporter of the British Labour Party and has created the Youtube channel Labour Social [30] in cooperation with other political commentators on Youtube, with the main co-author being fellow Labour supporter Phil Moorhouse.

References
  1. "Graham Hughes on Instagram: "Huge and unstoppable thanks and kudos to @laurasbakeryliverpool for my fabulous, epic and incredible birthday cake(s)!!!! 😍😍😍 THANK…"". Instagram. Archived from the original on 25 December 2021.
  2. "Fastest time to visit all countries by public surface transport". Guinnessworldrecords.com. 31 January 2013. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  3. "Graham's World". National Geographic Channel - Videos, TV Shows & Photos - Asia. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  4. "Graham David Hughes - Back to Save the World". Retrieved 9 May 2017.
  5. "I am the FIRST (and ONLY) person to visit EVERY COUNTRY in the world WITHOUT FLYING. I now live on a private island in the Caribbean. ASK ME ANYTHING!!! : IAmA". reddit. 30 November 2014. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  6. "NBCNews.com Video Player". NBC News. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  7. "BBC News - Global filmmaker arrested again". BBC News Online. 11 September 2009. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  8. McCathie, Charlotte (11 September 2009). "Fears for arrested round-world filmmaker". The Independent. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  9. Luke Traynor (5 February 2013). "Graham Hughes: Guinness World Records won't count adventurer's trip round the globe - Mirror Online". mirror. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  10. "Go Graham!". WaterAid. 23 December 2008. Archived from the original on 30 November 2012. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  11. "Most Countries Visited in One Year By Scheduled Ground Transport". Guinness World Records. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  12. Cormack, Greg (16 May 2010). "Globe-trotting Brit sets a new 'Guinness' record for itchy feet". The Japan Times. Archived from the original on 25 July 2010. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  13. Kim, Soo (27 July 2014). "Every country without a flight: trip gets Guinness record". The Telegraph. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  14. "Lonely Planet's The Odyssey". IMDb.
  15. http://www.ngceurope.com/pressroom/releases.aspx?id=324
  16. Hughes, Graham (15 October 2017). "MAN OF THE WORLD by Graham Hughes". Kirkus Reviews.
  17. "BBC News - Round-the-world trip film goes viral". BBC News. 5 August 2013. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  18. "Graham Hughes travelled the world without flying or driving". BBC News Online. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  19. "Globetrotter hits 201 countries on shoestring budget, without air travel". CBS News. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  20. Dan Martin (10 October 2013). "This Is What Every Single Country in the World Looks Like For One Second". BuzzFeed. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  21. Jones, Chris (26 December 2013). "Meet the Guy Who Circumnavigated the Globe Without Taking a Plane". Esquire. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  22. "Fun Stuff and Competitions". heatworld. Archived from the original on 19 December 2013. Retrieved 1 December 2014.
  23. Martin, Kim. "The Winner of "SOS Island" Survival Series 2013 is… Graham Hughes!". snakkle. Archived from the original on 30 December 2013.
  24. Hughes, Graham. "Cheap Travel: 10 Secrets of a World-Record Globetrotter". Bankrate. Retrieved 2 February 2018.
  25. Wright, Jade (28 February 2016). "Happy Global Scouse day! Get ready to tuck into a bowl of the good stuff..." liverpoolecho. Retrieved 2 February 2018.
  26. Traynor, Luke (17 May 2017). "Explorer leaves his private South American island - to run as Liverpool MP". liverpoolecho. Retrieved 2 February 2018.
  27. Dempsey, Noel (22 June 2017). "House of Commons Library - Lost Deposits". Commons Library.
  28. "BBC Election Results: Liverpool West Derby". BBC News Online. Archived from the original on 10 May 2015. Retrieved 10 June 2017.
  29. Gillet, Francesca (9 September 2017). "Tens of thousands of anti-Brexit activists march to Parliament". Evening Standard. Retrieved 2 February 2018.
  30. url=https://www.youtube.com/@laboursocial
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