I’m on a bus, writing. Writing to say that I did it, I have travelled around the world. I have travelled around the world in a year, (almost) without flying, and with only a few thousand Euros. And I cansay it now, as the bus I’m riding is not just a bus, but it’s last one of this crazy trip, the one taking me from Bergamo airport, where I just landed, to Milan...

Yes, I am going back home, to surprise friends and family for Christmas, as Luca and I always intended to do. This is why I’m writing to you all now, because even if I don’t like endings, it’s also true that just like in the best stories, after so much walking and so much writing we’re drawing to a close, and it’s only fair to celebrate that. And the only word I can think of is thank you. Thanks to Luca, first of all, an unparalleled friend and travel mate, but also thanks to you all, and I mean it, it’s not rhetoric, because as I said a year ago in the opening piece of this travel log, happiness is nothing if it’s not shared, and that has been the best part of this experience. I shared it with a dear friend, side by side every single day, but I also shared it with all of you.

All of you who, since the beginning, as soon as you heard about my crazy idea, in that January that feels like ages ago, supported me straight away, encouraged me, and made me feel understood. You with whom I shared our pictures, my posts, you who wrote emails and messages, with unfaltering affection. And then you whom we met along the way, maybe just online, thanks to the curiosity that made you discover our website and our adventure, and you whom I met personally while we were walking around the world. Fantastic people with whom I shared part of an unforgettable trip, side by side along long roads, or for a few days, maybe just for one drunken night or for a few hours, you are all, in any case, a part of me. Thank you, everybody. Looking back, my memory goes once again to those 110 people having dinner on the 16th of January 2010, just before I left. I want to thank you all once more, each one of those 110, for coming along, and not just for the fundraiser you organised that night! It’s already been almost a year, but I remember two of you approaching me halfway through the night, telling me the bets were on. How long before I came back home? Two months according to the most pessimistic, six months for the most hopeful. We laughed, and I said: “Well, we’ll see.”

And now here I am, 46 countries later, a year of travel weighing on my back, and the way home in front of me. And if it’s true that the world is just a ball and a year is just twelve months, it’s also true that I really did go around that ball. And I have seen things, met people, felt emotions that a lifetime wouldn’t be enough to relate, but I still feel like I need one last step, the one that will land on my footprints. Because this is another thing I understand, after all these months, that the stronger the man, the heavier the footprints, you can go as far as you want, but those footprints will always be behind you, showing you where you come from. It’s impossible to lose them. And personally, at twenty-nine, after growing up in a small town, living in several cities, touring all of Europe and a good part of the world, I finally understand where my home is. And it doesn’t matter if this home is in no particular place, because now I understand that the idea of home has nothing to do with geography. Home is where my friends and family are, it’s a huge city stretching from San Bonifacio to Milan, from Savona to Venice, from Paris to London, from Lisbon to Melbourne. That is my world. A home that includes all my life, in each and every one of the people who were really a part of it. And now I’m going back home, stepping on my own steps, but well aware that they are now longer, my footprints bigger, their mark more confident. I went around the world, and now I’m going back home.

See you soon.