SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, Ill. -- The Guinness World Record for the fastest time to travel to all seven continents is three days 14 hours and 46 minutes, or that’s how long it took in 2020 when this was accomplished last.
Capt. Jonathan Buckingham, 618th Air Operations Center chief of short range allocations, is attempting to break this record.
Buckingham has always loved to travel. His love of travel allows him to learn and experience other cultures and meet new people. He often travels with his sister and their very close travel friend.
He has been to all seven continents, all 50 states, six out of seven world wonders and one ancient world wonder.
To begin, he will be in Antarctica on an overnight excursion. He then will go to Chile, New York City, Rome, Cairo, Dubai and Perth. Buckingham will be landing in Perth, Australia, after traveling for three days 14 hours and 20 minutes.
If all goes according to plan, then he will be beating the world record by 26 minutes.
“If I fail, that’s life and I’ll just have to try it again in the future,” said Buckingham “That’s what makes it fun. The continual pursuit of happiness.”
While watching The Bachelor, Buckingham’s sister saw contestants who had completed the record themselves. She suggested that he should try it.
“That was back in 2020. Due to Covid, I had to wait until now to make the attempt,” said Buckingham. “I like trying new things and I want to have experiences that are ‘non-standard.’”
Buckingham said planning this trip is like planning any other trip, except in a more time constrained sequence of events.
“I had to search for flights to major international airports on every continent with flight routes that allowed me enough time to leave the airport on each stop and kept me on time,” said Buckingham. “When I ran into one roadblock because of timing, I had to pivot and find a new airport to fly in and out of.”
Buckingham has been to all but one of the continents that he’s traveling to so it’s not about seeing new places for him on this trip, it’s about beating this record. This will also set himself up to beat other records in the future.