This 30-year-old visited every country in the world. Here’s how he paid for it

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It took 1,458 flights and 1,117 buses and trains for Drew Binsky to reach his goal of traveling to every country in the world.

And he did it in less than a decade.

CNBC spoke with Binsky nine hours after he touched down in his last country — Saudi Arabia — about how he financed his 10-year travel spree.

Visiting every country in the world

According to your tally, you’ve been to 197 countries. How do you define “country?”

You’re hitting me with a hard one right away. It’s very political. The U.N. has 193 recognized sovereign states. I add four to that — Kosovo, Palestine, Taiwan and Vatican. Some of these are observer states of the U.N., and they are also the four most recognized of all the unrecognized “countries.” I think I’m like the 250th person to visit every country.

Is there a name for this group?
The “every country” club. It’s a small community, and I’m friends with maybe 20 of them. There’s a lot of drama. It’s like: “You actually haven’t been to North Korea because you only went to the border of South Korea.” I don’t get involved in all that.

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