FAIRBANKS -- Jeremy Marie has two small backpacks, a well-worn notebook, a $7 daily budget, and most importantly, a functioning right thumb.

That modest list is more than enough to accommodate a trip around the world, and Marie has spent the past two years proving it.

The 25-year-old Frenchman stopped in Fairbanks last week, the northernmost stop on a 100,000-mile hitchhiking voyage. If all goes the way he expects, he'll be on the road for another three years before making it back to his hometown of Caen, France, in 2012.

Marie launched the trip on Oct. 8, 2007, with a simple motto see the planet without spending a cent on travel.

So far, he's made it through Europe, Africa, across the Atlantic Ocean and through North America while achieving that goal.

"It's basically just my dream to travel the world," he said in a thick French accent while sitting in a University of Alaska Fairbanks dining hall. "I didn't need more than that."

Marie sees part of his mission as being an ambassador, so he stops at schools and community centers along the way to discuss his trip. A Web site offers updates in both French and English to those who are following his journey.

Marie, who worked as a waiter and at a tourism office in France, saved 10,000 Euros -- nearly $15,000 -- for what he originally expected to be a two-year trip. His arrival in Fairbanks marked that goal, but he's nowhere close to being done.

So he'll continue south today, working his way back down the Alaska Highway before hitching east across North America, south to the tip of Argentina, across the Pacific Ocean, then across Asia and the Middle East before returning home.

Marie said he's been in 774 vehicles so far, and has made his voyage without being especially picky. He even accepted a lift in the back of a garbage truck while heading through Mexico.

The trip has had a few lags, particularly in Cape Town, South Africa, where he needed to figure out how to hitch a ride across the Atlantic Ocean. He spent three weeks there before a company that delivered sailboats to the Caribbean offered him a job for room and board.

"They were looking for somebody, and I was looking for a ride," he said.

He's only turned down three rides during his two-year odyssey, most recently from a visibly drunk woman who offered him a lift in Wasilla. Marie said she almost caused a pile-up during her illegal U-turn to pick him up.

Hitchhiking doesn't have a stellar reputation for safety, and many of the countries that Marie has traveled through, like Sudan and Ethiopia, are known as international danger zones. His approach is based on the simple premise that people are basically friendly and willing to help a weary traveler.

"There are more good people than bad people," he said. "I've been happy to see that."

Aside from a few items stolen from his backpack in Central America, he said the trip has been just what he'd hoped -- a testament to warmth, tolerance and open-mindedness. Throughout his trip, he has stayed with strangers he met over the Internet or simply camped outside when weather permits it.

"When you go to the worst places with a big smile, it's really easy to be welcome," he said.

For travels in North America, he sticks out a thumb and holds a laminated sign that reads "World Tour." In Sudan, he learned that the unusual code for hitchhikers is the phrase "Please my uncle." In Muslim countries, a raised index finger does the job.

Regardless of culture, pretty much nobody likes a middle finger, he said, so that's not one of his signals.

"Sometimes they will stop," he said, "but they won't usually do it to give you a ride."

Even after two years, Marie said he hasn't become homesick. He may write a book about his experiences when he returns to France, but now he's too busy enjoying the road to consider a different way of life.