Windermere resident, Marine to hike across America for homeless veterans

WINDERMERE  Shane Johnson is going to need more than a few pairs of shoes for his upcoming hike.

After all, covering 22 miles a day for 65 days straight is no easy feat.

The Windermere resident, U.S. Marine corporal and founder of the Booyah Veteran Bus Project, is set to begin a cross-country hike on Sept. 11. He’ll trek coast to coast — from Florida to California — passing out 10,000 veterans’ hygiene kits to homeless veterans along the way. 

The Hike Across America is a collaboration between BVBP and Clean the World, a global health nonprofit that operates hygiene-focused emergency relief initiatives, education and more. It all stemmed from Johnson’s desire to do something to help veterans in need.

Johnson owns a mortgage company that conducts a large portion of its business in the Florida Panhandle area, where there are two large Air Force bases. While having a conversation with a real-estate agent about veteran issues one day, the agent told him stories about local veterans who needed medical services but struggled to find transportation.

“The transport to the VA is a shuttle bus, and they were walking eight to 15 miles, sleeping on park benches and then taking a two-hour shuttle ride,” Johnson said. 

After returning to Orlando, he knew it was time to do something to help homeless veterans and those without transportation.

“I’ve built businesses but never a nonprofit,” he said. “I went back, sat and thought about it and said, ‘The first part is to market it.’ I got with a couple of friends and said, ‘Why don’t we raise awareness with a hike?’”

CROSS-COUNTRY TREK

The first hike, which took place last year, spanned from the Veterans Affairs hospital in Lake Nona to Panama City. This year, Johnson will embark on the trek across America to continue raising awareness. The hikes represent the many homeless and transitioning veterans who have to walk to a VA hospital. They are split into 22-mile intervals to represent the number of veterans who commit suicide each day.

“We finished (last year) on Veterans Day and started to develop the project,” Johnson said. “As I was on the hike around election time, there were so many stops and issues with veterans we spoke with. I thought, ‘We have to do more.’”

As he hiked last year, he began to notice the transitioning problem. Veterans are trained, conformed and built to know everything about their mission, but it becomes hard to convert that knowledge to civilian life once out of the military.

“This is more of a grassroots effort: If we want to change or build something, we have to be bigger,” Johnson said. “The idea behind it was to be epic.”

This year, Johnson has combined forces with Clean the World to distribute more than 10,000 veterans’ hygiene kits, which include essentials such as soap, toothpaste, deodorant and socks. 

“I said, ‘Why don’t I walk across America?’” Johnson said. “We can combine efforts and show the local community that businesses can work together to give back to the community. I’ll be the face and do that part, if you guys can help us with the development of the nonprofit.”

Johnson will visit 20 cities over the span of the hike, passing out the kits, visiting homeless shelters and speaking on the importance of inspiring and reinvigorating homeless veterans.

JOIN THE RANKS

Although his wife, Missy Buchart, can’t help but worry a little bit about his safety over the span of the hike, she’s also been by his side, supporting every step of the way.

“It’s a wonderful cause; I’m very supportive of the cause and effort,” she said. “This is a huge problem that is overlooked or underserved. It’s a huge issue. … It’s a big part of what I believe in, but at the same time he’s going to be gone (for a while). It’s going to be interesting. It’s a huge sacrifice, but it’s kind of the same thing you end up doing if you’re in a military family. 

“My sacrifice and our sacrifice as a family is much smaller than what the average military family would go through,” Buchart said. “What we’re doing is nothing compared to what they’re doing. Unless you have a military person in your family, you don’t think about the sacrifices the average military family has to go through. It’s out of sight, out of mind.”

The hygiene kits cost about $10 apiece, and Johnson needs to raise the funds to pay for all 10,000 kits. Anyone interested can sponsor the hike, contribute and follow him on his journey. Those interested in helping sponsor the funds for the hygiene kits can contact their distributor, Clean the World.

“We’re showing people it’s multi-faceted,” Johnson said. “You’re an entrepreneur, you give back. You’re a family man, you can do things to show your children there is good in the world. You can show love and compassion and sincerity, no matter what your role is. The main thing is that even one person can make a difference. 

“From the military side, we are trained and developed and built to overcome anything in life, we just need to be inspired,” he said. “We just really want the word out there; we want people to join in.”

Contact Danielle Hendrix at [email protected].