Through the USA in Ninety Days

Currently the WorldWalk team prepare themselves for the USA stage of the tour. It seems that before the boys move on to conquer a new continent they need a few months to get ready. They need to put up the budget of the next stage, to upgrade and renew their equipment—to be able to cope with the new climatic and geographical challenges—, they (we) need to get organized and planned. We have already mentioned the financial problems and the partial solution the Ivanics brothers had come up with; now we’d like to give you an overview of these planning details.

There were two main starting points of the plan. First, the USA is across the Atlantic, getting there walking is simply impossible, at least without the help of a severe ice-age. Nowadays the chances to see a frozen Atlantic Ocean are quite slim, so we started to look for ships and flights across the great water on the Internet. According to the original plans the boys wanted to find a way to embark a freighter in Dakar and to pay with odd jobs on board. But the officers of the Dakar Port explained to our duo that in the 21st century their plan is nothing but a romantic dream. As the financial problems grew to be existential problems, they headed back to Europe, to Málaga, to find some temporary jobs there.


During those weeks everyone in the WorldWalk team searched timetables and specialized forums for ships to America, with no luck. It’s slow and expensive to travel by cruisers and freighters, and their schedule is seasonally unbalanced, after December it’s just impossible to find a westbound ship during months. The other chance was to get a flight. In February the prices were more then convincing, so there was not much discussion about it, we needed a “D-day” to make the plan. Unfortunately, due to some hesitation the prices have almost doubled, but István and Ferenc now have their flight tickets (for some 500 euros a piece), they will fly from Madrid to Miami on the 17th of May, on an Iberia plane.

There was another issue that we couldn’t overlook: the visa. Since November 2008 it’s possible for Hungarian citizens to enter the United States without visa. But if you enter under the Visa Waiver Program, you’re allowed to stay for 90 days only. If you want to stay for a longer period, you still need to apply for a visa. The right visa for the WorldWalk plans would have been a six-month non resident one, but in the given circumstances the application seemed expensive and quite hopeless. To travel back to Hungary for the documents, or to try to convince a Spanish officer during an interview in Madrid about the American roots and the sufficient cash background of the boys, well, they thought it was not worth it. So, after all, they will enter the USA in the Visa Waiver Program.

Since they walk, they won’t be able to travel around the world in eighty days as Phileas Fogg did in a Verne novel, but they surely will get to the Mexican border from Miami, in ninety days.


Ninety days are scarce, of course. If you check their original itinerary, you’ll see that they planned to cross the southern states all the way to the pacific coast before turning south. That was too much for 90 days. From Miami, FL to Laredo, TX the distance is about 1625 miles. That means 18 miles a day on average. It’s not an impossible mission. Though we have to see that if they make stops in the bigger cities—like Orlando, New Orleans, Houston and San Antonio—to find some local support, to have a chat about peace, brotherhood and friendship, they will have to focus on the walking stages. In theory they will walk some 22-24 miles a day. Not an easy task but they can do it.

So, think of them on the 17th of May. And please, share your thoughts.