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Hitchhiking . . .

21:38 / 15.05.02

Well, the topic reciently came up where I was asked how feasible it would, could be to hitchhike California... from South to North.

It made me wonder about it... anyone here familuar with this pass time?

who's done it?

where?

how was it?

What do you know... or don't know about it?

What have you heard about it?

...movies aside...

21:52 / 15.05.02

Regarding this new vagabond venture of your's, which will you be providing, PATricky? Will it be...

a) Gas
b) Grass
c) Ass
d) All ov the above

23:16 / 15.05.02

I'd say Gas & Grass...

Perhaps some gas FROM my Ass!!! But that may not get me too far...

08:35 / 16.05.02

when i was in chicago i hung out with a chick who used to hitchhike all over the place.... she'd just pick up and go, and never mentioned any bad trouble about it; she was itching to get up and go again when i was there. she's pretty small, but tough. i would imagine a guy like yourself (bigger than her, and a martial artist t'boot) would have little trouble, though i don't know much about the legal logistics....

when i was a kid, my mum and me used to hitchhike all over the place. it's a lot tougher now. in fact, when i was a baby, my mum hitched all over england and wales, staying on farmers' land and stuff. you could do that then. i still think she was pretty brave, just her and a baby. anything could've happened....

12:02 / 16.05.02

anything could've happened...

Do you (anyone, really) think people are more like to fuck with you now while hitchhiking or back in, say, the 60s? Is the dangerous aura around hitchhiking these days the result of sensationalism around Ted Bundy - style killings (very statistically unlikely(though of course, more likely for woman hitchhikers) or is it real? What I'm trying to say is, are there that many crazies out there who WOULD pick up someone just to rob/beat/rape/kill them or is it just a media creation?

12:09 / 16.05.02

no. that's my point; she was hitchhiking: a young woman with a baby, could easily be seen as a vulnerable target. she was staying on farmers' land, and the farmers' were mostly helpful and friendly. now, maybe the fact that she was carrying a baby acted as a deterrent, but there was nothing to prevent any of these people from mugging her or even raping her -- who would have heard, except for some cows?

my point was that it's a lot harder to find places to camp out or stay in, than it was then, at least in the uk -- espesh after they cracked down on the "new-age travellers" (never did like that term). i don't think it's necessarily more dangerousi terms of potential psychos, but in terms of finding safe spaces to stay, it's a lot more difficult, and there's a higher likelihood of hostility.

wembley can change in 28 days

14:08 / 16.05.02

One of my housemates hitched from Vancouver to Toronto and only had one weird run-in with a couple in a car that turned out to be a stepfather sort of consentually kidnapping his stepdaughter, strange stuff. Most of the time she rode with truckers, who are driving that long prairie road and don't mind chatting with someone once in a while. Sometimes they're talkative, sometimes not, so have something to read. And remember if you get a weird vibe, you can always refuse the ride.

Let me know how it goes; I'm considering hitching from Berlin to Stockholm in August, if it's too far to bike.

18:31 / 16.05.02

The closest I've heard about a bad story was told to me by a buddy of mine, who was hitching west from Michigan. One guy stoped to pick up him & his buddy & just as he opened the car & made eye contact with the driver he got one of those chills up the spine. His friend was about to climb in when he (my Buddy) reached his arm out to stop him. the Driver instantly hit the Gas & screatched off, the car door was still opened.

I had another friend who was hitching to southern Cali & got picked up by a Jeova's Witness Trucker. They spent the 5 hour drive talking God, with the trucker trying to "save" him along the way....

Not sure if that counts as a good or bad experience

19:38 / 16.05.02

There might be a reason you don't have people talking about their really terrifying hitch-hiking stories.

22:55 / 17.05.02

Jeeeze... a bnch of Home-bodies here!!! Doens;t anyone hitchhike anymore!!!

20:46 / 18.05.02

I'm what you would call a professional hitchhiker. It was my general mode of transportation in non-big cities, being the carless one that I am. The worst I ever got was some guy grabbing my tits, and the "what are you gonna do for ME?" questions were also not the nicest. The best I ever got was new friends and free drugs. I've actually met several of my friends through getting rides from them.

Being a guy nd hitchhiking, you'll get much less bullshit, but less people will stop for you. My advice it to try parking lots and red lights. This way you won't need to stick your thumb out. Ask a good vibing driver for a lift in exchange for smoking him out, maybe. You'll do fine. Beware of the norms though. You don't want to listen to them going on about their jobs for 3 hours now.

04:08 / 24.05.05

Turk said:"There might be a reason you don't have people talking about their really terrifying hitch-hiking stories."

Ok, so I generally try to avoid bumping really old threads, but I got the impression from reading this thread that most of the people who posted don't see hitchhiking as particularly dangerous, so I figured I'd put in my 2 cents.

While I've never had any trouble hitchhiking, I have had trouble from hitchhikers I've picked up. First there was the guy who tried to rob me (tried, heh heh), which should have taught me to stop picking up hitchhikers, but I just kept on doing it. And then, finally, I picked someone who grabbed my crotch, and then pulled the emergency brake while I was driving on the highway. The car spun in a circle and came to a stop in a clearing next to the road. I feel damn lucky that I didn't get injured or killed. After the car was stopped, I started screaming at the guy, and told him to get the fuck out of my car. His responce? "I was just fooling around, dude. Why are you so mad?" I kept on screaming, and he just seemed incredulous that I was leaving him by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere (as I'd said I'd give him a ride to town).

While I realize that most hitchhikers are just regular folks who need a ride, people like that dumbfuck who pulled the e-brake have ruined it for everyone else. I never pick up hitchhikers anymore, and I suggest none of you do it, either.

01:39 / 25.05.05

I've stopped hitchhiking and picking up hitchhikers since my daugter was born, but I spent a year or so hitchiking up and down California in the late '90s. The closest I ever got to a threatening situation was when I got a ride from some burnouts in an RV. I was headed down the 101 but they insisted on taking me over to Highway 1, where they said they would treat me to the night of my life in Half Moon Bay. After explaining, repeatedly, that I didn't want to go to Half Moon Bay or any where near it, they dumped me off on the 1, about 60 miles off course from where I wanted to be. The ride immediately after that was great. A nice woman went well out of her way to get me bback to the 101 when she had been planning on going straight home after a long day's work. She bought me coffee too.

My girlfriend, who was also hitchhiking a lot those days, has a couple of scarier stories. While that's three bad rides out of 36 or so, it only takes one ride going seriously bad to ruin your day. Be prepared to ditch or kick ass.

02:58 / 25.05.05

i still pick up hitchikers and used to do a lot of it, esp between sydney and canberra - this route takes me right past the belanglo state forest where ivan milat, now incarcereated for the term of his natural life, made a habit of picking up and finishing off hitchikers with his dick and a shotgun, whom he [and perhaps his brother, but that never got to court, so i wouldn't want to be held up for defamation, so don't quote me!] had picked up along the highway. all in all seven counts convicted, but who knows how many more...?

and i found out i lived about two kilometres from his family home in sydney - spooky!

but that never put me off and i have had some - and given some - great rides to a load of interesting people (and boring ones too!!). just don't see many hikers these days and now i am sadly much older i have a car and rarely have the need, though have mused on the concept once or twice.

always wanted to hitch the hummingbird highway in belize, just 'cause of the name! mebbe one day i will...

go do it, i say. if your times up, it's up and if you behave like you're supposed to be where you are you don't have a problem. trust instinct and go with serendipity, always the best travel companion.

03:00 / 25.05.05

...oh, and always have a sign! bits of boxes, whatever - take a good thick permanent marker (we call these 'textras' in oz, what other names they have?)

also, have water, a swiss army knife or similar, a lighter/matches and a smile.

03:21 / 25.05.05

I love hitchhiking, although I must admit that I've done a lot more hitching in Europe than I have in the U.S.. I've picked up a lot of hitchhikers here, though.

Hitching (and picking up others) is a great way to meet interesting people. I've been picked up by doctors, lawyers, all sorts of truckers, students, and once (near Inverness) a party of Americans who were in Scotland hunting for Nessie - and not just with binoculars, but two boats, a side-scan sonar rig, an underwater automatic camera network, and a UEV.

I've never had anyone who picked me up ask for any sort of payment for the lift, and I've been given food, places to stay, and once a temporary job running a youth hostel for a couple of months. I've caught rides that lasted 10 minutes and rides that took me 500 miles, and never had a single bad experience, and on a lot of my trips the people I met while hitching were the most memorable.

If you have the leisure to travel this way, it's one of the best ways to get around. Go for it.

03:27 / 25.05.05

Oh, one more thing. A great and little-known hitching aid is a giant cardboard cutout of a fist with an outstretched thumb on a stick. People think it's hilarious, and it allows them to see you from a greater distance so that they can react in time to pull over and pick you up.

Another hitching anecdote: my wife and I spent a couple of months during our honeymoon hitching around Britain and Ireland. In Ireland, we were at one point picked up by an astounded trucker who decided that he had to stop because he'd passed us three times already that day - going the same direction. We had kept getting picked up by people in little sports cars for short rides and had passed him repeatedly, and he decided that he needed to meet the people who were making better time hitching than he was while driving straight through!

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

08:00 / 25.05.05

I used to hitch all the time when I was signing on. I stopped after a particularly disastrous two-day (TWO FUCKING DAYS!!!) journey back to London from a Bowie gig in Exeter, accompanied by a friend with a large bag of amphetamines. First we were so trashed we got lost (ending up spending a night at Severn View services, from which we could SEE WALES and realised we were lost), then when the speed ran out we must have looked like zombies. Hell, I wouldn't have picked us up.

Fortunately I now have a job so I can afford trains and stuff.

11:19 / 25.05.05

When I was a teenager, hitchhiking was the primary way to get around. Most kids did it. Where I grew up was sort of semi-rural, no bus system at the time (there is one now), so if you wanted to go to parties or anything and didn't have a car (or were too young to drive), you had to either hitch or have your parents cart you around (sooo lame). I only hitched alone in the daytime on busy roads, because it was a little freaky at times.

My "bad hitch" happened one night when two girlfriends and I were trying to get to a party pretty far into the boonies. This van pulls over - and it's straight out of an urban legend, but I SWEAR this is true - they open the sliding door for us and there's no back seats, just a mattress or pallet at the back. A couple guys are in the front seats and one dude sprawled all over the bed. Beer cans are scattered all over the floor. And we're three 15-year-old girls suffering a massive lack of judgement, so we get in. They offer us beer, we politely declining. I am completely, silently freaking out and after not even a mile I just ask them to let us out.

They did so, but there was that terrifying minute between asking to get out and actually getting out that drove home just how utterly defenseless (and idiotic!) we were. I don't think I hitched at night again without the company of a male friend (none that that's much difference in the face of a psychokiller, but it felt safer).