Been re-reading The Canada Chronicles by Matthew Jackson recently, which is an account of some guy’s hitchhiking adventures over a four year period in the 90s in my country. Fun read, made me wonder if anyone here as any stories they want to share (will also accept shout outs for someone else’s cool hitchhiking story).
I hitchhiked a lot in my twenties, ie in the 1970s, and only had a couple of scary experiences. Once my boyfriend and I were picked up by a guy who was a Vietnam veteran. He told us horror stories while driving at high speed down one of NZ’s windiest roads. Another time in Australia the driver turned out to be a drunk. It was a long ride so we stuck with it, until it got dark and very frightening. My boyfriend finally persuaded the guy to let him drive.
The best hitchhiking experience was in France, around 1980. A friend and I got a lift from a very friendly, nice man. He knew a scenic route to Marseille, ok fine. At one point he asked if we smoked, and produced a big bag of weed. Bonjour! Very strong weed. Happy days.
Aaaand then he ran out of petrol. On a deserted stretch of scenery. It’s ok though - he had a jerry can in the boot and put out his thumb to hitch ahead to where he thought there was a petrol station. He was away for a very long time, and we started getting paranoid. There was a briefcase in the back seat. We opened it, and it was full of pornography - photos stuck to boards that fit exactly into the case. Sacré bleu!
Very stoned and fearing the worst (kidnapping), we decided to hitch away and abandon the car. Stuck out our thumbs and a car stopped. A man jumped out, and it was our driver! The petrol station was closed, so he had hitched PAST us to another one. He put the petrol in the car and we continued on our way. He took us all the way to Marseille as promised, gave us a couple of joints and waved us goodbye.