It took Phileas Fogg 80 days to travel around the world by hot air balloon, but some Eau Claire runners crossed the globe in about 30 minutes last weekend.

AIESEC, a UW-Eau Claire campus organization connecting study abroad students with business sponsors, held the Around the World 5K, Saturday in Carson Park

Event organizers set up booths marked as different countries along Carson Park’s paved running trail.

Camila Bedoya and Seama Rezai, both Eau Claire students and AIESEC members, stood behind the first booth on the trail — Colombia. A boombox bumped Spanish-language beats. Organizers spraypainted a Colombian flag into fresh snow before the race.

As runners cruised by the booth, Bedoya and Rezai stamped “passports,” runner’s number tags, with Colombia stickers.

Junior Samantha Dvorsak organized the fundraiser. She said the idea for the event caught attention from the national AIESEC chapter which chipped in funding for the event.

“We’re kind of trying to have a cultural experience while being active,” Dvorsak said.

Bedoya was born in Colombia, but moved to the states when she was a kid. Rezai studied in Colombia through AIESEC. Rezai is also the group’s vice president of expansions. She travels to ailing AIESEC chapters and coaches them on how to improve.

Rezai said proceeds from race registration fees will help fund a summer trip to a national AIESEC conference in South Carolina.

Brian Laskowski, who works as a landscaper, said he tries to run a 5K, half-mile or some kind of running event each weekend.

“I enjoyed the atmosphere, the people, it was just a really fun event,” Laskowski said. “That’s what it’s all about.”

Adam Alderson drove to Eau Claire from Northern Illinois University in Dekalb, Ill., for the race. He’s also involved in AIESEC.

“I’ve wanted to get more active anyway,” he said. “This is a nice little warm up to more active runs.”

About 20 minutes into the race, 5K frontrunners jogged into Colombia — again.

Alderson said the last fork in the trail wasn’t marked, and a handful of runners chose the wrong tong. Instead of crossing the finish line, the trail led them in a loop, and they landed back at the beginning of the route.

“The first few people in front got lost,” Alderson said. “I think we went around an extra loop. That kind of thing always seems to happen to me.”