After many years of touring, each individually and collectively, Rachel Davey and Martina Sebova had every visited over 100 of the 195 UN-recognized nations and territories on the globe.
The pair, who met throughout an overland tour of Europe again in 2008, had been having espresso collectively in Melbourne, Australia, after they first mentioned the prospect of visiting the 88 or so remaining nations on their lists.
They rapidly determined to spend the following two years doing simply that collectively.
While the considered touring to so many new locations in a comparatively brief house of time was considerably daunting, Sebova notes that having over half of the nations on the planet already ticked off made issues rather a lot simpler.
“I think it would terrify me if I had to start visiting every country and I’d been to like 10,” the journey blogger tells CNN Travel.
“I don’t really think that that’s even viable. You need to be well travelled [before doing something like this].”
The excited pair then started planning for his or her large journey, saving as a lot cash as they might with the intention to fund the journey, with the purpose of spending round 5 to seven days in every nation.
Before setting off in 2018, Davey and Sebova, who had been collectively for round a decade by this level, determined that they might not reveal that they had been a pair, and easily journey as mates.
“It was very natural,” says Sebova, explaining that they had been making use of for visas in some conservative nations did not wish to threat being denied entry.
“We were visiting a lot of countries where even the concept of a same-sex couple doesn’t exist,” she provides.
“And we didn’t really want to put our personal safety at risk at any stage.”
Davey and Sebova say that performing as if they had been merely finest mates “wasn’t really much of a change” and folks typically assumed that they had been sisters.
“It was never a big issue,” provides Davey.
“We never tried to cover it. We just didn’t [tell anyone].”
The first new nation they visited was North Korea and the pair went on to journey to Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Bhutan and Pakistan.
In 2019, they spent six months touring throughout Central Africa and say that the grueling bus journeys took a toll on them after some time.
“We did like 38 hours on buses, sometimes just changing vehicles, trying to get from A to B,” explains Sebova.
The pair say that a few of their finest experiences had been in locations that they had been extra cautious of previous to visiting.
“The people in Sudan and Iran were some of the friendliest people that we have encountered,” provides Sebova.
“And most people would assume those countries are really dangerous based on the image [we see].”
Eritrea, a small nation primarily based in East Africa, and the Caribbean island of Dominica had been among the many different stand out nations they visited.
According to Sebova, the truth that they had been ladies of their late 30s who weren’t married with youngsters proved to be considerably controversial in a few of the nations they visited.
“There are cultural differences with just being a woman and traveling without a man,” she explains.
“We were denied a couple of visas just based on that.”
Although lots of their mates had chosen to place their financial savings into mortgages and/or companies through the years, Davey and Sebova, who describe themselves as nomads, say they’re “happy to spend it on travel and worry about that later.”
Davey holds an Australian passport, whereas Sebova has a Slovakian passport, which sometimes brought on points when it got here to making use of for visas.
“Sometimes it was like, ‘you can get one here, [but I can’t] which threw a spanner in there,” explains Davey.
After years of travelling collectively, the pair are effectively conscious of their strengths and weaknesses, and every take duty for various duties throughout the journey.
They clarify that Sebova is extra naturally organised and focuses on ensuring their day runs as easily as potential, whereas Davey is “more flippant,” and fewer expert in relation to navigation.
“Rach gets lost in the hotel,” jokes Sebova, who additionally works as a tour information.
“I always say it’s a miracle that she made it through every country.
They had been on the road for around two years, and were just 10 countries away from achieving their goal when the pandemic hit.
The pair, who were in London at the time, chose to fly to Australia, and were inevitably forced to put the remainder of the trip on hold due to the border restrictions in place at the time.
However, they continued to travel, opting to buy a camper van and drive around the country together “with the borders of Australia closing behind us.”
“We ended up doing the massive lap of Australia in 18 months and spent numerous time in Queensland and Western Australia, which was superb, as a result of we could not go away the nation,” says Davey.
“We lived in our camper van and it was heaps of enjoyable.”
When travel restrictions were lifted for Australians in 2022, they were forced to wait until the borders reopened in the remaining places on the list, which included some of the Pacific Islands.
This proved to be particularly frustrating, particularly as many of their peers were traveling extensively now that the world had reopened, while they were patiently waiting for a few countries to lift restrictions.
“We began this journey considering that we might end this huge quest in our 30s,” explains Sebova.
“Then we tipped into our 40s throughout the pandemic and we had been sitting in a van, not proudly owning something, nonetheless ready.”
They were able to travel to the North African country of Libya where border restrictions had also lifted, but had to wait much longer for their final destinations, Kiribati and Samoa, both located in the Pacific Islands, to reopen.
Kiribati finally lifted restrictions for international travelers in August 2022, and the pair flew in a few weeks later.
They reached Samoa, the final country on their list, on November 19, 2022 and say it took a while for it to sink in that they’d finally achieved their goal.
“It [Samoa] was simply the right vacation spot to complete,” says Sebova.
“I had this second once I was standing in entrance of a map of the world and considering ‘oh my god, we have now been to each nation on this map.”
The pair celebrated the huge milestone with a friend, who’d flown out to the tiny island country, situated halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand, to meet them.
When they returned to Australia in late 2022 having visited every country in the world, they began receiving greater media interest and people starting to ask questions about their relationship.
“They checked out our feed and naturally noticed a pair, one thing that different individuals simply do not see,” adds Sebova, explaining that they were happy to confirm that they were in a relationship once they’d reached their target.
“We had followers on social media who had been like, ‘oh my god, I at all times thought that you just had been a pair, however you by no means stated something.'”
Davey and Sebova stress that, aside from the issue of safety, they wanted to keep the discussion around their trip focused on the fact that they were two women taking on such a massive challenge, noting that they when they initially looked into the few hundred travelers who’d been to every country in the world, the list was relatively male-dominated.
“You see so few ladies on this a part of journey, which is extra adventurous,” adds Sebova.
“So we had been attempting to vary that, in addition to encourage different ladies by exhibiting that it [the world] is just not such a scary place.”
Now that they’ve finally achieved their goal, Davey and Sebova say they have no plans to settle down and will continue to live a nomadic lifestyle for as long as possible.
They’re currently planning a trip to Thailand and hope to visit Indonesia later in the year.
“We’ve at all times lived within the second,” says Davey.
“That [being on the move] makes us each completely happy now. So that is what we’ll do. I do not plan too far forward. We by no means have.”
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Source: www.9news.com.au
