West-east? Macché, I go around the world via the poles!

The great Mike Horn, the explorer-sailor who has accomplished the most original feats on the planet (a brief biography of him can be found at the bottom), has embarked on a new adventure: circumnavigating the globe, in a “perpendicular” direction to the normal routes.

CIRCUMNAVIGATION? OK, BUT IN A PERPENDICULAR DIRECTION!
Horn, with his 35-meter icebreaker sailboat Pangaea (as well as with skis, kayaks, 4x4s and on foot, as is his style), will attempt to accomplish it by crossing the two poles. He left Munich on May 8 for what was christened “Pole2Pole.” The adventure, according to the South African, dourer roughly two years: “When you fly over a country, you don’t then say you know it. But when you cross it by machine, sic, or by sailboat, then discover so many new coos, immerse yourself in nature and capper better the life of the locals.”

AROUND THE WORLD IN 720 DAYS
With Pangaea, Horn is sailing to Namibia in southern Africa. Here in a 4×4 he will travel through the Namib Desert, then on to the Okavango Delta, Botswana, and then to Cape Town. From there he will board Pangaea again, all the way to Antarctica, which he will cross on skis (complete with a 200-pound sled), aided by a kite if the wind permits. Awaiting him are 5,800 kilometers to reach the South Pole, with mountains to climb up to 4,900 meters high. Then Mike will resume command of Pangaea to sail across the South Pacific to Oceania, via New Zealand and Australia (in Papua New Guinea he will embark, while he is at it, on a solo exploration of virgin rainforest in a Mercedes off-road vehicle). Once he reaches Asia, by land he will arrive in Kamchatka (yes, that’s the one, the one that made you damned in Risk) and then set course for the North Pole. On skis and by kayak he will eventually land in Greenland where the faithful Pangaea will be waiting for him and take him back to Europe, to the Principality of Monaco. Helping him organize this venture were his two daughters Annika (23) and Jessica (22).

A MAN WITH TWO BALLS LIKE THIS
A madman? An unconscious person? That may be so, but in the past, what is considered to be the greatest explorer of modern times (born in Johannesburg on July 15, 1966) has proven to have “square balls”. He was the first man, in complete solitude, to have traveled the Amazon River from its headwaters to its mouth, to walk to the North Pole during Arctic Night, and to circumnavigate the globe without using any motorized vehicle.

MIKE HORN’S LOVE OF SAILING
His love for sailing dates back to 1997, with a great mentor, the Swiss Laurent Bourgnon (recently deceased): Horn won the Multicocques Grand Prix, after which he was invited to join the crew of the Mari Cha III, as wincher, a position that requires great physical strength. Before long they broke the transatlantic crossing record: 8 days and 23 hours.

PANGAEA, “RESPONSIBLE” BOAT
Pangaea is a 35-meter ocean-going vessel that combines comfort and safety with versatility and innovation. Integrated into Pangea all the best of sustainable technologies with Mercedes-Benz BlueTec engines, solar panels, a recyclable aluminum hull.Goal: to produce energy with the lowest possible pollution emission. Pangaea was built in Brazil in a suburb of São Paulo, just 200 km away from the sea, and provided employment and income for more than 200 Brazilian families for a full year.