You might say that Alex Boylan traveled 45,000 miles to see his third-grade friends in Cottage Grove.
The star of "Around the World for Free," an interactive Internet program, arrived Wednesday morning at Hillside Elementary School with hardly a penny in his pockets after students tracked his journey through 16 countries.
There he was, not speaking to them on video from a foreign land but appearing in the flesh, a blue backpack slung over travel-hardened shoulders -- and the kids couldn't wait to meet him. An attempt at a long introduction in the school's cafeteria fell short when the assembled third-graders spotted Boylan standing behind them.
"The kids are about to lose their minds so we're going to turn it over to Alex," said Tammy Hanson, a parent and school volunteer who suggested the idea to mesh his travels with school curriculum.
Teachers got on board.
They worked Boylan's journey into math, social studies, geography, language and other subjects. Students sent him e-mails every week since last fall asking questions.
Suddenly he was in front of them with a smile as white as new-fallen snow, and the students roared their approval. Cottage Grove was his second-to-last stop on a journey that began Sept. 18, and the students wanted to observe his accomplishment in style.
Eight-year-old Alyssa Metcalf sang a song she had composed for Boylan, then another she'd prepared for his fellow traveler, photographer Zsolt Luka. "I was very nervous, myself," she confided later.