My hitchhiking career

As I'm currently reading a book written by a buddy of mine, relating our common boarding school life, I was suddenly reminded of all the hitchhiking I accomplished during my tumultuous life.

That technical school was about 20 miles away from my home, and almost every weekend, I would hitchhike back home, rain, snow or shine, and get home within one hour or so. By any conservative account, I definitely logged some 2,500 miles that way.

Except for one spectacular “doughnut”inside of one the car that once picked me up, smack in the middle of a village, and a few scares now and again with fast drivers bent to impress me, all went well. By any conservative account, I definitely logged some 2,500 miles that way. I'd return to my studies every Monday morning in the safety of a scheduled passenger bus.

Then came the military. Again, hitchhiking was a real time-saver for me over catching a train, considering that the route was extremely chopped-off and complicated, as 10 different rides weren't uncommon on such a long itinerary.

That time, I must have covered more than 6,000 miles, transported by the generosity of random motorists. In spite of that huge mileage, I only suffered one roll-over accident, escaped sexual predators, got lucky with drunk, bizarre, insane and reckless drivers, and always made it home safely. Like in school, the return to the air-base has to be a reliable, overnight train ride.

In both situation, the clincher, so to speak, was the uniform I had to wear; this elicited compassion and tremendously increased my chances for a fast pickup.

After I got my own car, I quit hitchhiking for a while but relapsed in July 1971, when after an endless voyage on an Italian ocean liner, along with a colleague, we decided to hitch the 1,690 mile ride from Perth to Adelaide hoping to rejoin the ship after land-crossing the Nullarbor plain (Route 94 was then a dirt road). I got luckier than my buddy and made it to destination in a couple of rides and just in time to jump back on the liner. 

That must have been the apex of my career as a professional hitchhiker, minus two extra incidents that happened to me later on, one in Vermont in 1982, when my VW Passat ran out of diesel and I had to find a way to get some and similarly on the Italian “autostrada” south of Trento, in 1985, when I had to twice cross the busy highway at night, a gas can in hand.

Today, more than 10,000 miles later, I haven't decided yet if and when I will resume this exhilarating activity.