Sandy Hazelip and Ellie Hamby met 20 years ago in Egypt. Neither imagined then that two decades later they would board a plane together in Dallas, Texas, with a single goal: to travel around the world in 80 days, as in the Jules Verne novel they loved so much.
The plan was born four years earlier, when they both dreamed of doing it when they turned 80. The pandemic disrupted their schedule, but not their desire. On January 11, 2023, both widowed by then, they set off for Antarctica as the first stop on a route that would take them through 18 countries on all seven continents: Egypt, Bali, Nepal, Zambia, Finland, Italy, and more. On March 4, they flew over the summit of Everest, something they had not even included in their best-laid plans as young women.
Sandy is a hospice physician, accustomed to accompanying people at the end of life. Ellie is a documentary photographer and had already visited 107 countries before this journey. Together, they documented every stage on social media under the name ‘Around the World in 80 Days at 81’, proving that eighty is not an age to stop, but a new excuse to start over.