Learn more at http://FrancisTapon.com
In this TEDx Talk, travel author Francis Tapon shares some of his traveling adventures, which include walking across America four times and spending three years visiting all 25 Eastern European countries. He discusses how travel can be a catalyst for transforming your life, giving you insights that are hard or impossible to achieve through other means. He also shares a personal story about his father, who motivated him to keep pursuing his dream of visiting every country in the world.

Speaker's bio: Francis Tapon was born and raised in San Francisco, California and has traveled to over 80 countries. His mom is from Chile and his dad is from France. He co-founded a robotic vision company in Silicon Valley. He consulted at Hitachi Data Systems and Microsoft. He thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail and the Pacific Crest Trail. In 2007, he became the first person to do a round trip on the Continental Divide Trail. He's walked across Spain twice. He wrote "Hike Your Own Hike: 7 Life Lessons from Backpacking Across America." After spending three years in Eastern Europe, he wrote "The Hidden Europe: What Eastern Europeans Can Teach Us." He plans to visit all 54 African countries in 2013-2016. He has a degree in Religion from Amherst College and an MBA from Harvard Business School.