Charlottesville, Virginia to Tombstone, Arizona (approx 3000 miles; 02/98-03/98)
Tombstone to Glacier National Park, Montana, via the Grand Canyon, Canyonlands, Rocky Mountain National Park, South Dakota and Yellowstone, Wyoming (2000 miles; 06/98-08/98)
Vancouver, BC to Todos Santos, Baja California, down the Pacific coast (2500 miles; 11/98-12/98)
Todos Santos to Charlottesville, Virginia, across mainland Mexico (2500; 04/98)
Albuequerque, New Mexico, to Los Angeles, Yosemite, Tucson, San Diego and then to Todos Santos, Mexico (2500; 10/99-12/99)
Todos Santos to Charlottesville (2500; 01/00)
Also various other trips around the States, Mexico and Canada, as well as France, Germany, Ireland and the UK
I chose to hitch-hike for a few reasons: mainly, initially, out of a combination of necessity (ie, lack of funds) and adventure (ie, I had already driven across America twice, and it felt like hitch-hiking was a 'step up'; driving's pretty cool but it's often dull and lonely, as well as expensive, whereas hitch-hiking across the country seemed like it would be a much bigger adventure, a real step into the unknown). Also, the only other alternative in America is taking the Greyhound, which I had done before, and which I found infinitely less appealing than spending four hours by the side of the road in winter. Greyhound sucks.
As I got into hitch-hiking, though, my reasons changed – it was like I had discovered a whole new world, a whole way of life. I met the most amazing people, who showed me the most amazing kindnesses; who restored my faith in mankind and opened up all sorts of possibilities for me. I was taken to places I would never have otherwise heard of, let alone visited. I began to see a sort of 'perfection' in life, in the way that the rides matched my needs, took me to exactly where I needed to be, at exactly the right time. Things sort of seemed to make sense, add up. And I was free – free to abandon my hitching for the day and walk off into the hills or the desert; free to hike across wildernesses and emerge out the other side and carry on; free from all the burdens of a car. Free from the need for money, too – I probably spent an average of about £2 a day on the road, because there was nothing to spend it on (I had my home on my back, my transport in my legs and thumb). So those are some of the reasons that I continued 'choosing' hitch-hiking.
2. How do you go about catching a lift from people?
Mostly you just go and stand by the side of the road and stick your thumb out. It helps to choose a good spot, so if I was heading West, I'd walk to the western edge of town, near to where the highway begins, and find a place where people can pull over. Other times, though, I have hitched from within the middle of a city (in Brighton, and Paris) and that has worked too. Or been in a spot where it seemed impossible to get picked up – where cars were going 70mph for instance – but I've always got picked up, even there. When I first started hitching I'd always have a sign – always carried a marker pen and found bits of cardboard on which to write my destination – but I stopped doing that after a few years, because it didn't seem necessary, didn't seem to matter. And a sign can limit you, because a big part of hitch-hiking is letting go and letting the road decide where to take you. So I haven't used a sign in years, and it doesn't seem to have made a difference. Probably the last sign I made just said "Somewhere Cool" anyway!
3. What is the best and worst things about hitch hiking?
The best thing about hitch-hiking is the freedom, the adventure, and the leap into the glorious unknown, as well as the meeting people. Sure, there're the other benefits, like how cheap it is, and how much more comfortable and less mind-numbingly dull it is compared to the coach – and, in Britain, how much quicker it can be when compared with public transport, but, for me, my abiding memories are the times when I've been picked up by the most wonderful people, been invited home and offered food and sleep and been shown around town, even for several days; when I've thought I wanted to go one place – even, several times, wanting to go back to England – and when I've ended up in a completely different place, and found something wonderful (in '98, for instance, I was travelling through California and preparing myself to go home the next week, when hitch-hiking randomly led me to bump into someone I had met four months earlier and 2000 miles distant – actually, through hitch-hiking as well! – who then persuaded me to go to Mexico; another whole set of adventures began, and it was another year before I made it back to England – that kind of thing happened more than once); the freedom of it, being dropped off in the middle of nowhere, some remote Arizona desert outpost, some crossroads miles and miles from the nearest sign of life, and the sound of the crunch of your feet on the desert floor, the slamming of the car door, and then the long, slow fade of the noise of your departing ride as he disappears into the distance – and then it's just you, looking around for twenty miles in every direction into empty, rocky wasteland and the silence of the desert is enormous; that's pretty cool. A dream come true. The level of freedom you have is incredible, everything you need on your back, and all choices available to you, whether to walk, to thumb it, to camp out somewhere, to rest, to eat – totally alone, and yet company and movement only a stuck-out thumb away. The kindness of countless others – not only in picking me up, but in their manner, their way of life – rubbed off on me immeasurably, and changed me for the better, and changed me for good. Simply put, hitching across America was the best thing I ever did.
The worst things are – well, to be honest, the worst things are all really challenges to be overcome, so it's hard to think of them as the worst things. I mean, you could say that standing for hours by the side of the road is kinda crappy – but you could also say it was an opportunity to learn patience, to learn to maintain positivity and optimism in ostensibly negative circumstances; at least, that's what I got from it; at least, that's what it taught me. You could say that meeting scary people is bad – but you could also say that it's a lesson in trust – because trust plays such a big part in all this, and realising that there is some unseen power at work, and that it can be trusted is probably one of the biggest things I got from this – so really having to deal with these people is another challenge, another lesson. Although I must say there were a few that were a bit annoying, mostly a handful of gay guys who would weave these ridiculous, obvious stories that always ended with them wanting to get it on with you. In all, though – and despite what I imagine to be public opinion – even in America the number of crazies/unpleasant rides was probably only about 0.01%. Really, the only bad memories I had of this were in the very beginning – this was winter in Tennessee, sub-zero temperatures and rain and snow – when I was still wondering why the hell I was doing this, as opposed to living in a comfortable house with a nice girlfriend (that's what I'd given up), when I hadn't discovered/stumbled on the magic and the joys of it or conquered my challenges, and at the very end, when really I'd done everything I needed to do with hitch-hiking, and things were becoming a bit repetitive (lesson learned already) and when I was perhaps getting a bit old for standing by the side of the road when I had money for a train and when there just wasn't really very much left for me to find there. In a nutshell, the worst things are only the worst things if you make them that way – otherwise, pretty much, they're all challenges that will actually make you a better person. Apart from the rain! :-)
4. What benefits do you gain from travelling in this way rather than more obvious (and perhaps easier) forms of transport?
Probably already outlined above, I think. Even now, though, I should add that when I've done it recently, here in England, I've found it much quicker, much more comfortable, much more interesting – you still meet great people, and have great conversations (hitch-hiking conversations go pretty deep, pretty fast, for some reason) – and obviously much, much cheaper (ie, it's free) than taking public transport. I recently did Yorkshire to Norfolk in four hours; Norfolk to Tewkesbury in eight; all the while meeting really nice and interesting people, the time flying compared with the drudgery and discomfort of the coach, the expense of the rail (okay, trains are pretty nice – but still nowhere near as much fun as I had on those recent trips).
5. We can't ignore the safety issue of hitch hiking? What advice would you give to others worried about their safety?
Honestly? Don't worry about it. The big thing about hitching, for me, is learning and experiencing the bigger picture, the underlying magic in life, in synchronicity, in the grand design and your own personal destiny. Hitching should be a voyage of discovery, a real learning experience – and learning trust and going beyond your fears is a real big part of that. You also learn that there's a real truth in the law of "you attract what you are" – so that the kind of people that pick you up somehow mirror you (for example, when I gave up drinking and drugs, I suddenly stopped being picked up by people who offered me drink and drugs, even though they had been totally prevalent and frequent before). You have to learn how to trust – or you have to do it until you do. If your number's up, your number's up, simple as that; everything leads on from what has come before. Obviously, if you get a really bad feeling about someone then you don't have to get in a car with them – you've got to learn to trust your feelings – and if you're a pretty weak and docile person, you can probably expect to be taken advantage of – you've got to be strong, got to know and do what's best for you, got to have it within you to stand up for yourself. Hitch-hiking will act as a magnet, because you're so totally open to life, to the universe, and you will attract not only what you yourself are, but also your fears, your lessons, and things that will pry your shortcomings. It's a challenge, and if you're not up to a challenge, and to a real learning experience then don't do it. People will also say it's different for girls – and maybe it is – but at the same time I've met plenty of girls who have done this and who haven't had any problems, because they weren't 'victims'. I never had any problems, and I've done over 20,000 miles, over several years, over probably several thousand rides. The worst thing that ever happened to me was some guy asking me if I had a big foreskin – that's not bad, really – that's, let's be honest, far less than you'd expect in everyday life, in your own city. As far as I can see – judging by my own experience – hitch-hiking across the US is far safer than driving a car, going to a pub or nightclub, getting drunk, or walking through an English town late at night. Hitch-hiking probably gets a bad rap, just has this stigma about it, and I guess that's why it's dying, why people are afraid – both to do it, and to pick people up – and yet, as far as I can see, it's totally unjustified. Why worry? What is there to worry about?
6. Can you pick out one anecdote that sticks in your memory about your hitch hiking across the States?
One? Sheesh, that's hard! I could probably pick out one hundred. Lemme see…
[Thinks for five minutes]
Okay, I'll tell you what I'll do; I'll attach a little thing I wrote for a creative writing class - [August the First] – that'll save me time trying to narrow things down, and, also, it's already there. Hope that suits you! And I hope this helps. Let me know if you want any clarification or want to ask any further questions – I love answering questions about my life!
Thanks, and I hope all is well,
Rory
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