By Cindy Yurth
Tséyi' Bureau


(Times photo - Cindy Yurth)

Martin Vosseler, 59, a retired doctor from Switzerland, is walking across the United States to promote renewable energy and climate change awareness. Vosseler will be at the Day's Inn in St. Michaels, Ariz., until Saturday, when he will start walking toward Gallup.

DEFIANCE PLATEAU, Ariz., Feb. 21, 2008

That wiry bilagáana you saw pulling the little wheeled cart along Route 264 the past few days is not a homeless person.

Meet Martin Vosseler: retired physician, Guinness Book record-holder, climate crusader.

Meet him, please - that's what he's here for. Or at least check out his Web site, www.martinvosseler.ch.

Vosseler is walking across the United States- and, at the moment, the Navajo Nation - to promote awareness of climate protection, renewable energy and energy efficiency.

But don't worry, he's not preaching doom. He wholeheartedly believes the earth's people will rally to reverse global warming, led, he hopes, by the Americans.

"We will make it," he says, his smile fracturing his weathered 59- year-old face into pleasant ravines. "I am sure we can do it. We can do it together."

Vosseler is not just some pie-in-the-sky guy either. When he says, "We can make it," it's because he's already shown the way.

A few years ago, Vosseler and four buddies crossed the Atlantic in a boat powered entirely by solar panels. They were the first humans to do so, landing a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records.

The secret, he says, is very, very efficient motors.

"We crossed the Atlantic on 1,700 watts," he said. "That's about the power of a hairdryer."

Vosseler is counting on American engineers - whom he considers the world's most innovative - to come up with ultra-efficient engines to harness the wind and the sun.

"If we could get every engine to 90 percent efficiency," he maintains, "there would be more than enough renewable energy to power the world."

The only reason it hasn't happened yet, he said, is because all the world's energy is in the hands of a few giant corporations, and Planet Earth has yet to become an "energy democracy."

"It's understandable that those who hold the monopoly don't want to let go of that," he shrugged. "But they'll have too. We're almost out of oil."

Vosseler practices what he preaches. He got to the U.S. from Switzerland on a cargo ship - much more energy-efficient than flying, he says, although the rough crossing occasionally made him wish he were miles above the Atlantic instead of right on its surface.

From Boston, he made his way to California by train - a 68-hour ride that was "just beautiful."

It's taken him seven weeks to walk from Los Angeles through the Mohave Desert to the Grand Canyon, Tuba City, through Hopi just in time for the Bean Dance, and now into Diné Bikéyah.

From here he goes to Gallup, south to Texas, on to Tennessee where he'll walk a few miles with former vice president Al Gore, then on the Washington, D.C., and ultimately Boston - "my second home." He did a fellowship at Harvard back in the '80s.

Every so often, Vosseler stops for a few days to update his blog and download a few pictures. At the moment, for example, he's at the Day's Inn in St. Michaels, Ariz., so if you live in the area and would like to invite him to speak to your group, this is your chance.

He can be reached by email at vosolar@gmx.net.

Vosseler says he's been overwhelmed by American hospitality - "I could have 30 rides a day," he says, but of course he politely declines. He will accept offers to pitch his tent in your yard for the night.

But if you see a tanned, lean bilagáana walking and singing a tune, do wave to him.

"I wave to everyone, and four out of five people wave back," he said. "It gives me a little boost to keep going."

Talk about renewable energy.