St. Cloud Couple Running Their Way Around the World

ST. CLOUD -- A St. Cloud couple has combined two of their passions, running and travel. Jay and Jodi Johnson just came home from a trip to Zurich, Switzerland and Bergen, Norway where they ran in marathons in both countries.

For Jay, it was the 45th and 46th country he's run a marathon in. He says it all began for him when he ran his first marathon in 1995.

And then I ran a marathon in all 50 states.  That didn't cure my travel bug, and so somebody asked me off the cuff, "what's your next plan?"  And I said I'm going to run 50 countries to match the 50 states - not meaning it - and yet it's coming to fruition and it's looking like it might happen.

Jay says he met Jodi about halfway through his 50 country goal. Jodi just completed marathons in her 20th and 21st countries when they were in Switzerland and Norway.

Their journey will continue this fall, they are already planning marathon runs in Indonesia and Vietnam.

We're going to see some wonderful temples in Indonesia, we want to see Halong Bay in Vietnam, and we thought boy those two marathons are a week apart, that's got Johnson fun train written all over it.

Running 26.2 miles through the countryside of a foreign country will give you a very unique perspective of their people and their culture.  Jodi says their worldwide adventures have changed their lives.

Realizing how fortunate we are in the United States for everything that we have.  I didn't realize until I started traveling internationally that we are so fortunate just to have running water.  That's a big deal and a lot of people in the world don't even have that.  So it's very humbling to see what other people - the conditions they live in.

Jodi says her favorite marathon was in Tanzania, and for Jay his is Siberia.

They say there are websites out there that they use to help them find the marathons across the globe.

Jay has completed a total of 217 marathons since it all began for him back in 1995.