Karl Bushby is close to completing his 28-year walk from Chile to England

Karl photographed in Chile at the beginning of his adventure — Photo: reproduction via BBC

For 28 years, adventurer Karl Bushby has traveled the world on foot. Now, he approaches the end of his journey.

I've been writing about him for most of that time. Although we spoke frequently and exchanged hundreds of emails, we never met in person.

We meet in the town of Havré, and I accompany Karl for an eight kilometer stretch to Mons, in Belgium.

It's part of his final walk to Calais, from where he plans to swim across the English Channel in October.

Wearing shorts and a T-shirt that shows signs of having been mended during the trip, Karl — who sports a gray beard — appears in the parking lot of a Belgian train station.

He pushes a cart loaded with camping gear and other essentials.

At the age of 29, Karl left Chile towards his hometown, Hull, England, following two rules he had established for himself: not using means of transport to advance and not returning to the United Kingdom until he had completed the journey.

Karl Bushby, right, alongside the BBC's Kevin Shoesmith, on their way to Mons, Belgium — Photo: Crispin Rolfe/BBC

The Adventure of Karl Bushby

Sweat seeps through his t-shirt, forming wing-shaped stains on his shoulder blades.

This former parachutist began his trip in November 1998, calculating that the journey back to his childhood home — where his mother still lives — would take around 12 years.

Some 28 years later, he is still on his way, although his progress has slowed down due to visa restrictions, the 2008 financial crisis — which made him lose sponsors —, Covid-19 and geopolitical issues.

On its route, it crossed Argentina, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia and the Tapón del Darién towards Panama.

It passed through Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico before crossing to the United States and Canada.

It crossed the Bering Strait, between Alaska and Russia, and traveled through Siberia, Mongolia, China, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan.

He swam across the Caspian Sea to Azerbaijan.

Then, he went to Turkey before entering Europe.

The 57-year-old has covered more than 48,000 kilometers and is now considering swimming across the English Channel, after those responsible for the Eurotunnel rejected his request for access to a service tunnel.

Karl quickly enters a store and comes out with a bottle of water, which he attaches to a bungee cord on his cart, a vehicle he made himself in Nicaragua at the beginning of the adventure. "The Beast", as he calls her, is his lifeline.

Karl arrives in Mons, Belgium, as his adventure draws to a close — Photo: Kevin Shoesmith/BBC

We maintain a fast pace. With a temperature of 30°C, I struggle to keep up, while Karl shows no signs of tiredness, despite having already walked 10 miles before lunch.

We talked about how he crossed the frozen Bering Strait in 2006 alongside French adventurer Dimitri Kieffer and about his 300-kilometer swim across the Caspian Sea.

When talking about his crossing of the Tapón del Darién, which connects Colombia and Panama, Karl comments: "You have to make your way through a dense forest."

"You find river systems and a lot of swamps. And to top it off, there's the fact that it's a war zone," he says.

Faced with the threat of kidnapping, Karl tried to look like a homeless person.

"Homeless people are practically invisible: no one pays attention to them; that was our intention. I didn't want to be the blond, blue-eyed gringo with the latest equipment from The North Face," he says.

And he adds: "I dyed my hair and my skin and left my clothes in tatters. I carried my things in bags."

Karl fighting the ice while crossing the Bering Strait to enter Russia in 2006 — Photo: Karl Bushby via BBC

'Persistence is the most important thing'

A woman appears at the window and observes, disconcerted, the two men and the cart.

Karl invites me to push "The Beast" for a while. The black tape that covers the handlebars is worn and starting to come off.

As we progress, our conversation becomes more philosophical. I ask what the biggest lessons learned from the walk were.

“Persistence is the most important thing,” he responds.

Karl has difficulty maneuvering "The Beast" between a row of parked cars. "These cities can be fun obstacle courses," he sighs.

Returning to my question, he adds, "Coming from a military background, you don't always see the best in people, so this opened my eyes. From day one, the rest of the world welcomed me with open arms."

Karl says he set out to prove to himself and others what he is capable of – Photo: Kevin Shoesmith/BBC

“They drove for eight hours straight to find me and give me food on the side of the road,” he recalls.

When Karl started the trip, he only had US$500 in his pocket and had no sponsors.

Afterwards, the expedition began to be financed mainly with its own resources, obtained through publications — including his book "Giant Steps" — and lectures.

I reach into my backpack and pull out a letter from Karl's mother, Angela Bushby. In the bag there are also packages of your favorite sweets.

“Mommy remembers,” he says, laughing, as he picks out some caramel cookies.

The last time they saw each other was in 2015.

"You're still her little boy, aren't you?" I ask.

“Apparently, yes,” Karl responds. "A very happy boy with all that chocolate."

In the letter, Angela asks if he really needs to swim across the English Channel. Both mother and son know the answer.

And then a sentence appears that says it all.

"You used to think you were good for nothing. Well, you've proven that's not the case," Angela wrote.

I've always known that Karl tends to downplay his own achievements, but it shows in the letter.

He tells me he never felt as fit as his peers during his time in the Army.

Karl, whose father served in the SAS (UK Special Air Service), says the Army helped him gain confidence, but the "damage was already done" in early childhood when undiagnosed dyslexia made him the target of bullying.

"I didn't have confidence in myself. I had low performance. My dyslexia was only detected in my last year of school," he says.

However, Karl never doubted that he would be able to complete his journey.

"There is definitely this desire to prove something to myself. To myself and to others. We are talking about doing something that other people could not even dream of doing", he argues.

'It's time to put an end to it'

For years, Karl faced the completion date calmly. Not now. There is a real urgency.

“It’s definitely time to put an end to it,” he says. "I don't want to keep doing this much longer."

We arrive in Mons and its impressive Grand-Place, where several young people, recognizing him from his Instagram account, go directly to him.

"My God, you're a legend," an enthusiastic young man tells Karl.

Is Karl afraid of the future?

"Yes," he admits. "One day I'm going to wake up in my mother's house: at 57 years old, with nothing but my things in a bag next to the bed."

We arrive at a cafe and Karl orders orange juice.

I ask what the hardest part of the trip was, but instead of talking about bubbles or fear of crime, he says: "It's the relationships. I fell in love twice, I lost these people and that leaves scars."

"The physical pain, yes, you can bear it. But falling in love and then having to keep walking? That takes you completely off track."

He tells me that he feels "true euphoria in the face of a good horizon."

As we stand in a beautiful square, with the famous bell tower of Mons towering above us, I ask Karl if he ever stops to really take in the view.

"Sometimes you just don't have the energy," he admits.