3,400 miles across 170 North American cities in only 374 days would be
a pinnacle lifelong achievement for one person, but not for Daren Wendell. This was just the beginning of his global trek known as The Earth Expedition (theearthexpedition.com), which he founded in 2006 to raise awareness for the lack of clean water and AIDS pandemic in Africa.
“I
had to sell everything I own to do this—literally. All the walkers [who
commit to walking a leg of the expedition in various countries] do so
by raising their own support,” Wendell explains.
Participants
often sacrifice everything to hike thousands of miles for each leg,
most often alone. Along the way, they visit various coffee shops,
conferences, churches and schools to raise awareness and funds for the
effort.
Together
Wendell and the group plan to traverse three continents, 14 countries
and 18,000 miles—taking 36 million steps in all to provide clean water
to Africa.
