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THE WORLD BY THUMB

100% hitchhiking - 100% world tour - Since 2013 - By Florence Renault

MY PROJECT

 

 

Camerawoman, photographer and travel blogger, I have traveled around the world exclusively by hitchhiking cars, boats and planes for seven years.

The adventure began from Orléans, my hometown, on July 2, 2013. I crossed the Atlantic Ocean by hitchhing a sailboat. Then I traveled two years around Latin America, before doing a tour of North America (until Alaska) for a year. In March 2016, I crossed the Pacific Ocean by hitching a containership to New Zealand.

Thanks to a Working Holiday Visa (WHV), I worked for three months on a dairy farm. I also meet my boyfriend Sebastian who were a permanent resident then. In December 2016, I crossed the Tasman Sea by hitchhiking a sailboat to Australia. A few weeks later, Sebastian resigned his job to join me and we worked in a vineyard (thanks to a second WHV).

After more than a year in Oceania, we reached the Asian continent in September 2017 by hitchhiking three ferries and three planes.

I traveled three months alone in Vietnam and China, then I met Sebastian for a few weeks in Japan in July 2018. I kept hitchhiking alone along the Silk Road from China to Turkey for four months. In total I spent two years in Asia.

Sebastian meets me in Turkey in November 2018. We tried to reach Africa but it took us five months because we got stuck all winter on the island of Cyprus and make a detour through the Middle East.

We have been traveling in Africa since May 2019. We went down along the Eastern Coast then I went up alone the Western Coast ... to Cameroon. A few hours after I entered the country, on March 16, 2020, the government announced the closure of the borders because of the Covid-19 pandemic. I refused to return to France by a repatriation flight because I did not want to give up my 7 years hitchhiking world tour so close to the goal. In July 2020, international flights resumed and my boyfriend, stuck in New Zealand, managed to join me in Cameroon. To this day, the land borders are still closed and we are waiting their reopening to travel our last 10,000 kilometers to France.

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Tour du monde en auto-stop

Presentation Video Filmed Before Departure

LE MONDE SUR LE POUCE - Looking for a boat to America
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