Tom Turcich may win the award for world's best dog dad after a record-breaking walk with his rescued pup, Savannah.
The New Jersey native and his now 7-year-old dog, a puppy he rescued from an adoption center in Austin, Texas, have successfully hiked 29,826 miles around the world,
He has become the 10th person to do this and Savannah has become the first dog to complete the feat.
Turcich told Good Morning America that he thought "it would be nice to have a dog with me" after nearly four months of solo touring.
Aside from pure camaraderie, he said: "I asked her to protect me - it's useful, but after all we've spent so much time together.
and you're camping in all these weird places and it's nice to have someone by my side. .", I can share everything.
Turcich said he lost a close friend when he was 17, which prompted him to pursue a life of travel and adventure
"It helped me a lot, I realized I could leave at any time," he said. "I want to understand the world, so it seems that traveling around the world is the best way to solve all these problems."
He saved, going to school, paying off loans and living at home for eight years before he started, he said the journey "basically dominated my life for 15 years,
basically from the death of my friend until the end of [our journey] a month ago." Turcich shared his journey under the Instagram name @theworldwalk, which has over 117,000 followers.
All the time he's traveled the world, Turcich said, he's been reminded of "great people everywhere," adding that "probably someone in every country has helped me."
"99.9 percent of people are good people," he said. "After that, I had a lot of confidence...a lot of confidence."