Have you thought about getting on a boat and always sailing straight without being bothered by anyone? You would cross the seven seas without encountering any land or human being - unless you were very unlucky! The longest distance you can do this is just over 30, 000 km!

This trip, never made, leaves the coast of Pakistan, passes between the African continent and Madagascar, approaches Antarctica, goes around South America and ends in northeastern Russia. Check the route on the map below, remembering, of course, that although it seems all winding, it is a straight line that follows the curvature of the Earth:

Straight line trip would have 32, 000 km

If you still doubt that the line is straight, you can watch a video showing the route by clicking this link. Who first designed this sea route remains a mystery. However, environmental lawyer Patrick Anderson is believed to have adapted it through information he collected on Wikipedia, but these coordinates were put there by someone who is not known. Anderson reportedly published this track on Reddit more than 5 years ago.

But while Anderson did an impeccable job, he was an amateur on the subject. Therefore, Irish physicist Rohan Chabukswar and Indian engineer Kushal Mukherjee developed an algorithm that could analyze various data from the globe to analyze whether Anderson's plot was correct and if indeed no portion of land would be found on this hypothetical trip. And wasn't he correct? The total route is 32, 090 km, starting near the port of Karachi in Pakistan and ending near Kamchatka in Russia.

The Chabukswar-Mukherjee duo also calculated the longest land route without crossing large portions of water, which would be a trip between Quanzhou, China, and Sagres, Portugal, for a total of 11, 241 km across 15 countries. However, this information is not accurate, as a supposed route runs between Wenzhou, China, and Greenvile, Liberia, which would have 13, 733 km.

Above, the largest straight land route proposed by the researchers; below, the version with more than 2, 300 km that circulates on the internet, but without proof

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