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Many teenagers long to travel the world after they graduate from high school, but very few plan to do so the way a teenager named Liam Garner did—by bike. Inspired by adventurer Jedidiah Jenkins’ book To Shake the Sleeping Self, the young man set out to cross the Americas on his bicycle. While the adventure was not free of obstacles and moments of almost giving up, Garner completed his feat in 527 days, crossing 14 countries and traveling over 20,000 miles.
Garner, who hails from Long Beach, California, began his trip in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, the northernmost point in the United States accessible by road on August 1, 2021. “At 17 years old, I’m going to be the youngest person to ever do it. It’s gonna be the hardest and probably best thing I’ve ever done in my life,” he wrote on Instagram to mark the beginning of his trek. His route then took him to the frozen landscapes of the Yukon, British Columbia, and down to Washington State and Oregon.
At first, his mom opposed the idea of him crossing the continent on his bike, but quickly became his biggest supporter. Almost paradoxically, his parents were also one of the sources of inspiration for this trip. “My whole family is from Mexico,” he explains, adding that he had traveled there many times as a kid, but never really had a chance to take in the culture. “So crossing the entire country on a bike and reconnecting with my culture and staying with my family and learning the language in the place my family is from was so deeply important to me,” he told CNN. He spent four and a half months biking across Mexico, exploring places such as Zacatecas, Mexico City, and Oaxaca.
After dealing with being robbed (for the first of many times) and the extreme heat, he toyed with the idea of going back home on a bus when he reached Central America. Nevertheless, he persisted and was greeted with cooler weather as he made his way to Guatemala, and then to El Salvador, which he described as “one of the most peaceful, nicest, quietest countries.” After 10 months on the road, he made it to Panama, which marked the beginning of the latter half of his route.
Unfortunately, his biggest setback took place in Colombia, where he had to spend a month in a hospital after falling off his bike and landing on his head. “I was blacked out for about 15 minutes and it took me a few hours to even be able to speak again,” he recalled. He got around 40 stitches and had plastic surgery to fix his ear and stitch it back together.
After regaining his health and exploring many Colombian cities such as Cali and Medellin, and taking in the green landscapes of the Antioquia and Nariño regions, he went down to Ecuador, where he biked to the farthest point from the center of the Earth—the Chimborazo volcano. “I’ve never camped at 16,000ft before, let alone even been that high up in my life at all,” he wrote, before making the trek across the Peruvian desert and into Chile.
The final leg of his trip took him to Argentina—specifically to Ushuaia, widely considered the world's southernmost city. After crossing the famous Carretera Austral, he reached the end of the road on January 10, 2023. “I remember that first day, 17 years old in the Arctic Circle, a year and a half commitment looming in front of me,” he wrote at the end of his trip. “Now I’m here, surrounded by the mountains of the end of the world, and the kid looking down that dirt road to Fairbanks, so full of ambition, feels farther away than that first pedal stroke ever could. Nothing is more important than hope.”
Despite achieving his dream, the adventure is not over for him. His partner, Chloe, met him at the end of the world, and after going camping around Patagonia to celebrate this milestone the way he wanted—peacefully, and not in a touristy area—they will backpack home together to Southern California, a strike contrast to traveling solo for many months. “To not only have more time to experience these places,” he says, “but to do so with the person I love is a blessing.”
Teenager Liam Garner decided to cross the Americas by bike. He began his trip in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, and traveled all the way down to Ushuaia, Argentina.
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Garner completed his feat in 527 days, crossing 14 countries and traveling over 20,000 miles.
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“At 17 years old, I’m going to be the youngest person to ever do it. It’s gonna be the hardest and probably best thing I’ve ever done in my life.”
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Liam Garner: Instagram | TikTok | Patreon
h/t: [CNN]
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