Karl Bushby completes English Channel swim

Adventurer Karl Bushby says he has completed a multi-day swim of the English Channel, stepping foot on UK soil after a 28-year journey.

Bushby, 57, left Chile, South America, on 1 November 1998, following two self-imposed rules - not to use transport to advance and not to return home until the journey is complete.

On Tuesday, he announced that he had swum from France to the UK - the final, major hurdle of his journey back to his childhood home in Hull.

Bushby said: "[It] feels good to have UK soil under my feet after all these years. It hasn't been easy, and that's part of the point; proving I'm more capable than I give myself credit for."

He added: "All of us can accomplish more than we will ever imagine."

Bushby said he swam for 20 hours over three days, making landfall at Shakespeare beach, just south of Dover, at 15:30 BST on Monday.

HM Coastguard said it "liaised with French authorities and maritime sector partners to ensure safety protocols were met".

Bushby's team said he was welcomed on the beach by a small gathering of friends and family, including his father, Keith Bushby, a former SAS soldier, and acclaimed filmmaker Werner Herzog, who is directing a feature-length documentary about the journey titled Walk of Life.

For many years, the French have only tolerated cross channel swims departing from the UK - not from France.

However, Bushby's team said permission had been sought from both French and UK authorities, and said they chose not to publicise exactly when it would take place "for safety and security reasons".

To date, Bushby has covered more than 30,000 miles (48,000km), including 29 countries.

He walked the length of South America, crossed the treacherous Darien Gap and continued north to Alaska.

From there he crossed the Bering Strait on foot, swimming where necessary.

Bushby then traversed Siberia and the rest of Asia before swimming across the Caspian Sea, which took 31 days to complete.

He crossed into Europe last year and arrived at the English Channel last month.

The journey has been dogged by problems, with visa restrictions, the 2008 financial crash which cost him sponsors, Covid-19 and geopolitics having all stopped him in his tracks.

In June, Channel Tunnel bosses vetoed his request for access to a service tunnel , which he said left him with no other option than to swim.

In September, when the BBC met Bushby in Belgium, he said how he felt it was "definitely time to call it a day", adding: "I don't want to keep this going for much longer."

He said he had always been fascinated with nature and horizons, which fuelled his thirst for adventure.

It is expected he will reach Hull by early November.

Listen to highlights from Hull and East Yorkshire on BBC Sounds , and watch the latest episode of Look North .

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