After a cycling accident in Berlin left him bedridden for around three months in October 2022, David Bossek had little to do but lie back and reflect.
Recovering from a broken hip and deep vein thrombosis in his leg, the German videographer, now 35, spent hours reevaluating his life. He realized he’d been given the “rare gift” of being able to hit pause and decided that, once he was back on his feet, he’d finally pursue his dream of traveling around the world.
Yet Bossek, who was working in environmental science at the time, had no desire to simply hop from one tourist hot spot to another on long-haul flights. Instead, he envisioned a journey almost entirely overland and by sea, tracking his carbon footprint along the way with the goal of compensating for his environmental impact.
Setting off from Germany in 2024, Bossek has since traveled more than 90,000 kilometers (over 50,000 miles) across seven continents as part of his four-year “ONE PLANET Expedition” — a project he describes as a living environmental experiment. Traveling this way, he says, has completely changed his perception of what it means to move through the world.
“It lets you connect with the people and places you meet, and it gives you a different feeling for the distance itself,” he tells CNN Travel via Zoom. “I feel like the beauty comes more if you slow down, go to one place and really experience it. Really try to connect with the place, and then also try to figure out how you can leave a positive impact within the places you travel through.”
To track his journey, Bossek created a carbon calculator designed to measure, reduce and offset his travel emissions.
His initial route took him through Europe to Estonia, then south, and on to Gran Canaria and Tenerife, where he volunteered as a videographer at a local animal sanctuary. Crossing the Atlantic by sailboat via Cape Verde, he arrived in Brazil before hitchhiking to Ushuaia, Argentina. From the southern tip of South America, he joined an expedition to Antarctica before gradually charting a path all the way north to Alaska.
The route brought significant hurdles, including being robbed in Brazil, and administrative roadblocks, such as being denied entry into Panama on his first attempt. “There are many, many moments where, of course, you doubt yourself,” Bossek says. “But this is also where the growth happens.”
He acknowledges the role that his German passport played in easing his entry into some destinations, with a level of visa-free access offering him privileges unavailable to travelers from many other nations.
Over time, Bossek’s approach to offsetting his carbon footprint evolved. Rather than waiting until the end of his expedition to calculate and address his total emissions, he focused on contributing financially to climate projects and donating his time and skills to local projects along the way. He has volunteered with huskies in Estonia, sled dogs in Alaska, and on an organic farm in Australia, while also organizing charity runs and group hikes.
“I don’t want responsibility to begin when the journey ends,” he says. His long-term goals include organizing tree-planting initiatives and eventually purchasing land to restore a degraded ecosystem.
However, strict adherence to a no-flying rule eventually proved unfeasible. In late 2025, after two years of surface-only travel, Bossek booked a flight from Anchorage, Alaska, to Baja California Sur, Mexico. Unable to travel overland through Canada, and with a seasonal ferry to Mexico — where he had two documentary projects waiting — out of service for months, he decided to fly.
“The circumstances explain my decision, but they do not erase its emissions,” he says, noting that the single flight wiped out a substantial portion of the carbon savings he had accumulated. He has taken two flights since, coming to terms with the compromise.
“Avoiding flights remains one of the expedition’s most important guiding principles,” he says. However, “preserving a perfect no-flying narrative” should not override “the expedition’s scientific, documentary and social purpose.”
From Mexico, Bossek made his way to Panama and sailed via the Galápagos Islands to the Marquesas in French Polynesia, eventually reaching Australia. There he hitchhiked through the Outback to Alice Springs and Yuendumu, before taking a short flight to the northern Australian town of Cairns after getting a last-minute place as a crew member on a boat bound for Southeast Asia.
“It’s not about the destination anymore,” he says. “It’s just the beauty of also having the time to explore and taking that time. Because in any other vacation or scenario, you would always have something or someone waiting for you. And that’s not the case for me.”
Bossek has been chronicling the journey on Instagram and plans to launch a YouTube channel later this year featuring documentary-style films about his journey, as well as some of the initiatives he has come across along the way.
Looking ahead to Asia and the Middle East, Bossek faces a new challenge in traveling through regions where he does not speak the local language. (He is fluent in German, English and Spanish and speaks some French and a little Estonian.)
“I could communicate in all countries I traveled through so far,” he says. “So, that’s going to be really interesting, and also how much the infrastructure and system over there will support my goal of traveling with as much of a reduced footprint as possible.”
Despite the excitement about what lies ahead, Bossek says that nearly three years on the road have taken an emotional toll. He admits to feeling increasingly homesick for his family, friends and the simple comforts of familiar food and a daily routine.
“My mom is always worried,” he jokes. “If I need a person to tell me what could possibly go wrong, I call my mom.”
Nevertheless, he says he can’t imagine being able to “stand still” for long and will likely be ready to head off on another adventure soon after he completes this one.
“It’s always going to be there, and I’m always going to be a person who loves to explore,” he says. “That’s not going to change.”
Financially, the expedition has been managed on a very tight budget. He started with little in the way of savings, but says he doesn’t look at this as a limitation, insisting the journey shouldn’t be “surrounded or defined by money.”
Bossek rarely pays for accommodation, relying instead on a tent, hitchhiking, and working as boat crew. He has navigated terrain by bicycle, kayak and even built a raft to float along the Bolivian Amazon.
He hopes that his expedition will inspire others to travel in a way that’s “more conscious, more slow, and more adventurous.”
Bossek expects to return to Germany in 2028, but says he’s not on a fixed deadline, leaving room for unexpected “side quests” and stories worth documenting along the way.
“If this journey has taught me anything, it is how unpredictable traveling this way can be,” Bossek adds, noting that “weather windows, boats, borders and changing political situations” can switch things up at any given moment.
“The direction is home; the exact route and timing remain open.”
Source: www.cnn.com
