Family attempt epic no-fly journey from UK to Australia to attend wedding
A British family have completed a mammoth four-month journey halfway across the world to attend a wedding.
Shannon Coggins was emotionally reunited with her sister Ellie in Sydney having made the monumental journey from Castle Cary in Somerset to the land Down Under via train, taxi, boat, bus and many other modes of transport with her partner Theo Simon and daughter Rosa.
The travelling trio will be enjoying a BBQ on the beach this Christmas which is also Theo's birthday and the day he gets his first pension payment. They will be joined by Ellie's husband Mike, his kids and their dogs, who they've never met before. Three days after swapping roast spuds and bread sauce for grilled shrimp and a few cold ones, they will watch the happy couple tie the knot.
Having forked out far more than the cost of three flights to get there and spent months stuck in the "boiling heat of third class trains", the mum is relishing the chance to dish the dirt on her sister.
Shannon was reunited with her sister Ellie"I am going to do a speech at the wedding. My sister isn't keen but I'm going to do it, I've got some stories to tell," Shannon jokingly told the Mirror, having just hopped off the bus to Sydney - the final leg of their journey.
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Shannon, Theo and Rosa decided to take on the 15,000 mile journey without flying in a bid to limit the damage they do to the environment. Flying from the UK to Australia produces roughly 3.5tonnes of CO2 per economy passenger, meaning a return flight accounts for 60% of an average Brit's yearly carbon footprint.
To avoid already potentially catastrophic global temperature rises of 2C by 2050, that should be cut to two tonnes for everyone on Earth, by one estimate. The family calculate that their journey has emitted 0.9tonnes of CO2 per person so far.
"Ellie emigrated four years after I'd given up flying, which I decided to do because of climate change. I love flying and travelling, so it wasn't easy," Shannon said, stressing that she did not want anyone to think she's better than them for avoiding flying.
"None of this is easy, love is bigger than all of us. Of course we want to see each other. We all work bloody hard. It's not about being better than anyone else. It is about 'is it possible?' It is about seeing the world.
"Just up the road from us here, there's these massive floods in Cairns and a bushfire that is out of control. That underlines the reason why we're trying to reduce our carbon budget."
Theo, who gave up his job in a factory to make the journey, said the Government was not doing enough to lead the way when it comes to decarbonising. "We just had Cop28. I saw the Government flew out on three different jets," he said.
"The fact is when it comes to holidays, we take a flight, we're stressed, we all want to get away. But all these private jet flights, we really have to take it seriously, we know we're going to get repercussions soon and we're not going to be able to ignore it anymore."
The family's journey has not been straightforward. A bubbling conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, and the danger of travelling through Iran, forced them on a four day detour through Russia where Theo was interrogated on a train.
The mammoth journey took four months (Buckle Up Dorothy)They've spent close to £1,000 on visas to Russia and China alone, although travelling through the latter country gave Rosa the chance to brush up on her Mandarin. The 19-year-old joined her parents on the trip ahead of starting college next year.
The biggest obstacle came right at the end, when the trio got to Dili in East Timor. Just 400 miles as the crow flies from the Australian coast and with the clock ticking to the wedding, the family realised they would have to take one flight.
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After three weeks of waiting for a ship to take them, they had concluded that the "door had closed" on their chances as the weather moved in. After "much soul searching", they flew the final stretch.
The small hiccup at the end of the first half of their travels has done little to douse the Shannon, Theo and Rosa's enthusiasm for the trip and their conviction that trying to fly less is a good thing.
"Instead of putting new carpets in the house, we've spent all our life savings on this incredible trip. We've learnt thank you and sorry in every language of the countries we've been through, being British," said Shannon, who worked as a teacher back in the UK.
"The kindness of strangers is incredible. So many times someone will chose to come and talk to us and help us. It has been phenomenal. And for me as a mum. Rosa wanted to come with us. She wanted to spend time with our sister. It's an incredible world we live in, and to see her see that has been incredible."
After spending two months in Australia and then making the return journey home, Shannon and Theo plan to find work in their local Tesco.
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