Continent number seven, the Antarctic Peninsula, December 2024. Photo by Gerardo
About
I’m Dan – an adventurous, adrenaline-fuelled explorer from Cambridge, UK, with a thing for travel, bucket lists and permanently itchy feet.
- 121 countries visited
- 7 continents
- 119 bucket list goals ticked off
- 75 countries to go
Hello, I’m Dan
I like to see new things, meet new people and see what the world has to offer. Life is too short to spend it all in the same place doing the same things over and over again. For me it’s all about new experiences.
“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”
Mae West
I’ve never really been the kind of person who settles in one place and calls it ‘home’. I moved around a lot as a kid – many houses, many schools – and it followed me into adulthood and just kind of stuck.
I didn’t get the chance to travel much when I was young; holidays weren’t really a thing in our house. I did visit India twice, as I have family ties there. Aged 6 I saw the Diwali festivities, and aged 10 I was taken around Delhi, Agra, Calcutta (now Kolkata), Bombay (now Mumbai) and Goa. Somewhere there’s a photo of me at the Taj Mahal – I’ll share it if it ever surfaces.
How it started
I had a paper round from 13 and started working in a supermarket at 16 – around the same time I moved out of home (not by choice, I should add). I’ve been making my own path ever since: making mistakes, learning, making more mistakes and making it up as I go. It’s been a tough ride at times, but I wouldn’t change a thing, and I’m proud of where I am now.
In my early 20s I landed a job that took me to Germany for around 18 months. Looking back, that was the start of my wanderlust. Then came the chance to go further afield as an IT contractor. It was a leap into the unknown – gone were the pension, the company car, holiday pay and sick pay – but it turned out to be one of the best moves I ever made.
The role had me on aeroplanes far more than at a desk: a dream job for a 25-year-old with no ties. For two years friends would ask “where in the world are you today?”. Trips lasted two to six weeks, and there was usually time to see the sights, mix with the locals and find the places they go. That’s what got me into travelling in a big way.
Around the same time I read Richard Branson’s autobiography and was incredibly inspired by it. I haven’t achieved what he has, but I’m very happy with the track it put me on.
“A passionate belief in your business and personal objectives can make all the difference between success and failure. If you aren’t proud of what you’re doing, why should anybody else be?”
Richard Branson
The bucket list
It was also around then that I first saw the film The Bucket List with Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson. I loved it. I’d already done a lot of cool things, there was a bunch more I wanted to do, and you never know when your time may be up. I was inspired.
So I started my own list. I have a terrible memory – I’d read about something amazing and forget it moments later – so it had to be written down. It began on a scrap of paper, and as it grew a spreadsheet was born (I am an IT guy, after all).
Now there are over 200 things on it, and I’ve ticked off around half. I’m a massive advocate of writing your bucket list down, so if I can inspire just one person to start theirs, I’m happy. Have a look at mine.
Big yellow trucks
After a few desk-bound years in Cambridge, with weekend trips around Europe and the odd week’s holiday, I took a leap of faith and moved to London in 2014. Being so close to the airports reignited the travel bug – it’s the perfect base for cheap weekends away in Europe.
Four weeks of holiday a year wasn’t enough, though. In late 2015 I put my things in storage, quit my job and spent six months overlanding South America on a big yellow Tucan Travel truck called Rosita.
That didn’t satisfy the appetite, so next came overland Africa with Oasis Overland – another big yellow truck. Part one, Gibraltar to Cape Town, ran from November 2018 to May 2019: raw, beautiful Africa. After a spell in the UK, India and Spain (where I got my skydiving licence), part two took me from Cape Town to Cairo between June and November 2019, with more wildlife and remarkable sights than I can count.
Then, on 31 December 2019, I set off on a two-month Central American adventure, heading south and ending up in Colombia – another magical country – just before the world shut down.
Since then
Since the pandemic I’ve mixed travel with running. Marathons have become my excuse to see new places – the Greenland Icefjord Marathon, Amsterdam, Rome, Berlin, Chicago and the Marathon du Médoc (twice, wine stops and all) – along with Spartan obstacle races from Andorra to the Czech Republic.
In December 2024 I finally sailed to Antarctica on the Hondius, via the Falklands and South Georgia, making it seven continents. I’m now at 121 countries, with 75 still to go.
“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”
Helen Keller
About Pass The Passport
I’ve kept a bucket list since around 2008, and it keeps growing as I research and explore more. Some things on it are personal, some are outrageous and some are just dreams – but I firmly believe in this:
“The size of your dreams must always exceed your current capacity to achieve them. If your dreams do not scare you, they are not big enough.”
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
This site is meant to inspire, and to be a useful resource for anyone who loves travel, adventure and living life to the fullest. I don’t want to be the person looking back on life asking “what if?”. I’m happy to try and not afraid to fail – what’s the worst that can happen?
I strongly believe everyone should have a bucket list: write it down, look at it regularly and tick things off. Monthly goals, yearly goals, lifetime goals – it’s your list, and it can be whatever you want it to be. Whether you’re new to the idea or have kept one for years, I hope you find some inspiration here, from the bucket list to my country and city guides.
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
Mark Twain
If you have any questions, or ideas for my list, get in touch on Instagram or Facebook – I’d love to hear from you.
