A Modern Hitch Hiking Story - The Return Journey
Created | Updated Oct 21, 2006
Hitch hiking – Part Two
My eyes opened. And suddenly there was pain. I shut them to make it go away, but my battle plan was fundamentally flawed due my consciousness. I rolled around to try and make it stop and ended up falling off the sofa and smacking my face on the floor. What a hangover. I turned my face away from the floor, and there it was, taunting me. The bag showed that yesterday was not a dream. Its presence showed that I had hitch hiked 200 miles just for a party. It also told me that, yes, I would be doing the same thing today, only in reverse.
It had been a good evening. There were drinks, there was music and there were hula skirts. Although it did come to an unfortunate end in a grotty scum infested nightclub in the centre of Leighton’s black heart, which, thanks to the rubbish pop and cheese music, the gnarly grizzled clubbers, and the general tedium of the club, I was forced to drink in huge quantities. Being 6’6, an ex-alcoholic and descended from Viking lineage, I can take a lot of drink, but I really pushed it. And of course, people kept buying me drinks because I had hitch hiked 200 miles and I can never say no to free alcohol.
It took 2 showers, 4 cups of rocket fuel coffee, several pints of water and more painkillers than is medically advisable before I regained my basic motor functions. I knew that I had to leave soon otherwise I wouldn’t make it back before dark. It was still raining outside, and I didn’t want to move at all. My mother took pity on me and said she’d get me off to a head start. I flailed my arms around in a hopeless attempt to gain the power of flight before accepting her offer and letting her drive me out of town to the A5 and a certain roadside cafe that can't be named, but involves dwalves and their culinary skills. I tried to convince her she wanted to drive me all the way, but she wasn’t having any of it.
‘I can’t do it. I simply can’t.’ I groaned, slurping down my 6th coffee of the day.
‘Well Gregg, you done it yesterday, and you did fine, you’ll be able to make it back,’ she replied.
‘You don’t understand, I just can’t. I can barely stand, let alone stick my thumb out. What if they try to r*pe me or something?’
‘No-one is going to r*pe you Gregg.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you are 6’6. The only people who would r*pe you are suicidal. Give me a good reason why you can’t make it back.’
‘Err…’ I swung back in my chair trying to think of something better than being hung over and the slim chance of being assaulted by the anti giant hippy coalition, ‘… because people smell funny.’
My plot to get my mum to drive me home had failed. She kindly bought me some breakfast, gave me a fiver for drinks and suchlike, gave me a tub of paracetemol, and headed back for Leighton Buzzard. Then it struck me. Card! I didn’t have any bloody card! Not again, not like last time. Ok, this is the outskirts of Milton Keynes, not Wrexham. Although Milton Keynes lacks any personality as a city whatsoever, there is more culture in a packet of walkers crisps, more soul in a Brittiny Spears album and more passionately constructed architecture in a kid’s clay modelling class, I figured as the entire place looks like its come in click together sets from Ikea, there’s probably some card about. Wrong.
Fortunately, people in Milton Keynes knew what card was. The problem was every shop I went into had already put it out in their recycling bins. Outside. In the rain. One person managed to find a piece of card the size of my hand for me, which was very nice of her, but to be honest, I would’ve been better off writing ‘A5’ on my forehead. I ended up finding a garage, and thought, ‘Garage, car parts, car parts come in boxes, CARD!’ and went in to inquire.
‘Hi, I’m hitch hiking to Wales and…’
‘Hitch hiking?’ The grease monkey looked disgusted, ‘Why don’t you get a job you hippy?’
‘I’ve got one already, I just like hitch hiking.’
‘Why don’t you get a car or something?’
‘Well, I would, but I have this awful tendency to crash. Look, I was just wandering if you had some card for a sign.’
‘Don’t have any card in here, I just stuck all of my card out in the recycling; it should be in the bin out front.’
‘Something tells me it won’t be much use to me. Do you have anything else?’
‘Yes, I have this,’ he said whilst offering me a broken number plate.
Well it was better than nothing. So, not wanting to endure this man’s company any longer, I accepted it, gave him my thanks, and went back to the main road. I stuck my thumb out, and the fun began. It would be worth nothing here that at one point I noticed 3 cars full of men in uniforms drive past me at one point. Why would it be worth noting? Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to tell you more later on. Why tell you now? To spark your interest so you read on. Half an hour of waiting and I got a lift with a passing breakdown engineer type called Ted.
Ted told me how he couldn’t read my sign, but he stopped out of pity. I explained how troublesome acquiring card can be, not just going through what had happened in Milton Keynes, but going through the entire Wrexham episode. Ted then instructed me to look in the back of the van. In between all the tools and jacks were several huge sheets of card. For a second I was elated, but then horror struck me.
‘You’re a serial killer of hitch hikers and steal their signs as mementoes!’ I exclaimed.
‘Haha, no, I just seem to collect a lot of boxes.’
‘What do you do with them all?’
‘Well apart from giving pieces to scabby hitchers, my son likes to make forts out of them, recycling that is you know.’
Ted could only take me about quarter of an hour down the A5 before he had to turn off. Didn’t turn out to be the problem I thought it might be because as soon as I step out of his truck and put my bag down, a voice came out from over my shoulder, “Alright mate, need a lift?” Ben, a random trucker, had seen me at the roundabout previously, but was going the other way. Just like Ted, he couldn’t take me too far down the A5, but any distance hitching is better than walking. The wasps sign in the cab was a good start, anyone who watches rugby dislikes football, and so we cussed soccer for the entire journey.
‘I can’t stand the bloody sport. Load of pansies, I tell you.’ Ben said when I brought it up. ‘I mean, they get touched on the shoulder and go down grabbing their shins! Who trains these guys to play? Ex-footballers or hulk bloody Hogan?’
‘I personally want to see Man U take on the All-Blacks. Just once. I think it would be the greatest sporting event of the millennium.’ I returned, ‘Ok, it would be over in a few seconds, but those few seconds would be more action packed than any football game ever. Imagine Rooney’s ugly face contorted in pain as the All-Blacks pack into him.’
‘I’d rather not imagine that little gimps face contorted if it’s all the same to you.’
‘Haha, I just don’t understand why people watch it. It’s 90 minutes of boring sport played by overpaid thugs, then after the match, instead of simply enjoying the game, people go out and split their opposition’s head open with whatever is to hand. What’s the point?’
‘Hey I don’t know. My dad always said to me that Rugby is an animal’s sport played by gentlemen, whilst football is a gentlemen’s sport played by animals. Too true as well.’
The conversation continued in much the same vain until we reached a junction where Ben went one way and I went another. And it’s a quiet junction in the middle of nowhere. I knew instantly I was going to be here for a while. My thumb ached at the very prospect. Undeterred, I went straight about it. A whole hour went by in the same place. Slowly, my mind unravelled, and the snapping point was when I saw the three cars full of air force types go by from earlier. What the hell? How did I get in front? Are they watching me? Are they, in fact, in league with the Jesus Army? I had better take a new approach, otherwise my sanity wasn’t going to survive this place. A sign change was in order here.
I ditched the sign saying A5 and tried to come up with some original, witty and would get people to stop all at the same time. But, after an hour of just watching people fly up grinning manically with their thumbs up at me, my mind was fried. ‘B*gger it,’ I thought, and scrawled the only two words I could think of that could get me out of this hole. With a renewed vigour and an energy that I didn’t think it was possible for me to summon this hungover, I went back to the road and proudly stuck out my thumb. It worked, within five minutes, I was in a car getting away from the nameless hole that for the past hour I had feared would become my new home.
‘Don’t Panic,’ said Steven, ‘most amusing. I like a bit of humour on my journeys.’
‘Hitch hikers guide fan are you?’
‘What’s that?’ Steven replied.
It took a while, but I managed to explain, in brief, the entire hitch hikers guide to him. He said he’d look it up sometime, and in return, explained to me, in brief, the entire history of the A5. Enough information, in fact, for me to write an entire entry for H2G2. But, fortunately for you, I’d rather have my scr*tum deep fat fried whilst still attached then write about the A5. I know what you’re thinking, ‘Yeah right Gregg, you’ll get bored one day, realise there isn’t an entry for the A5, and write one, loser.’ Well, just to stop your s*ck prophecy from coming true, and seeing as this entire story (Well, not the first one, but this one you are reading now) takes place exclusively on the A5, here’s an impromptu history lesson for you.
In the beginning, there was darkness. And in the darkness, there were Celts. Strange beings who enjoyed running around wearing woad on their chest and had no idea of how brilliant digital radio was. Then along came the Romans, who, despite also not knowing how great digital radio is, had a better idea of how things should be done. With them, the Romans brought roads. The Celts didn’t take to the idea of roads and civilisation too well, so the Romans did what any understanding and civilised race would’ve done, they slaughtered those who stood against them and enslaved the rest.
The A5 was made so that the Romans could get from one part of the country, namely Marble Arch in London, to another, namely Birmingham. Why anyone would want to go to Birmingham is entirely uncertain. The Romans then came up against a problem. They wanted the A5 to continue, but this meant going into Wales where there were mountains and more Celts who were still pretty opposed to this whole road idea. Then things got a bit out of hand back at Rome due to a high number of barbarians who were also against roads, and had to do the off.
The Welsh then decided that perhaps this whole road thing wasn’t as bad as some people had made out, and decided to extend the A5 to Holyhead. However, as is typical with the Welsh, they got the wrong end of the stick. Whereas the Romans had designed the A5 to be a flat, straight, A to B sort of affair, the Welsh got a bit creative, and decided to bend it round every bloody mountain in the Snowdonia range. And that’s the official version of events. There’s apparently a bike race that goes along it, but why anyone in Marble Arch would want to bike to Holyhead just so they can bike back again is beyond me.
Steven dropped me off, and seeing as he was a chef, had left me with a mixed bag of goodies, from onion bargies to quiche Lorraine. I decided to take a break from hitch hiking and put my feet up and eat and plan out my route from here. Hitch down the A5. Great, planning over, let’s get on with the eating. It was at this point I got my next lift. I started seeing a few bikes go by, some bikers on a mission to nowhere I presumed. I was just sat there, innocently eating with no protruding thumbs when one of the easy rider crew stopped.
‘Nice sign. I see you’ve got a jacket,’ he motioned to my leathers, ‘so I assume you know how to stay on. Need a ride?’
‘**** yeah. Want a bargie?’
I never caught his name, what he does or anything like that. To be honest, I don’t think he cared. This was by far the most exciting part of my entire journey. We roared down the A5, and bar the troublesome irish threesome from the last hike, this was the fastest I’d moved hitch hiking. Although I was on there for quite some time, it all went to soon, and I got dropped just before V Festival.
‘We go a different way from here, hike up the road a bit and you’ll be able to catch a ride with people leaving the festival. Don’t get stuck in the traffic. Happy travels.’
And he was off. I was stunned. He actually said happy travels. He also said a bit. It was three miles before I found a decent spot to hitch from. I finally got the other side of V festival and caught up with people leaving. The suddenly, there they were. The same three cars full of air force personnel. And no, I’m not using artistic license to make the story more exciting. They were there, again, just casually passing by me. This time though, one recognised me, and looked as shock as I was. A mere few moments later, and Dan pulled up.
Dan is a seasoned hitch hiker, and would probably like me to add that he is also a director and wants to direct your action, or something like that. You see that Dan, you got a free plug! Who said picking up hitchers never got you anything eh? Anyway, Dan is hardcore hitcher material. He makes Ford Prefect look like a guy who is just going for a shower. Just Dan can now afford a car, so doesn’t hitch himself, but still picks every vagrant he sees up. We went on a lot about the importance of hitch hiking, from the social aspect, to the environmental aspect, to just the enjoyment factor. He wants to set up a hitch hiking website, but seeing as there’s already liftshare website, I suggest that if you are interested in that sort of ‘planned’ hitch hiking, you go there. Strangely though, Dan also had never read the hitch hiker’s guide.
I also thought I’d stick one of Dan’s stories in here, just so I don’t have to talk about myself and the A5 the entire time. This is while he his hitch hiking in Australia, and a rather odd lift he caught. It was all going well, apart from the fact the trucker had a crazy look in his eyes. Dan thought this was due to some trucker drug, but it turned out to be something a lot more sinister…
Quarter of an hour into the journey; the trucker turns to Dan,
‘You see that glove box there, boy?
‘Yeah, what of it?’
‘I want you to open it,’ Dan does as he is told and finds a pair of nunchuku, just innocently sat there in the box.
‘You know what those are?’
‘Yes, there are nunchuku,’ Dan responded a bit uneasily.
‘I know how to use them as well,’ The trucker said, taking a darker, more sinister tone in his voice.
‘Oh,’ Dan managed.
‘Do you know what I use them for?’ The trucker asked, a menacing question that seemed to hang,
‘Err… no?’ Dan was scared to the point of nearly wetting himself.
‘S****ing up hitch hikers!’ The trucker roared with laughter, who then proceeded to take Dan on a three day whirlwind tour of Australia.
Dan dropped me off just outside his house, which, although is still on the A5, happens to be slap bang in the middle of Snowdonia. Who the hell is going to pick me up from here? Didn’t take me half as long as I expected, before a girl picks me up. She lives in Bethesda, a small town just outside Bangor and takes me from the middle of Wales to Bethesda. She works on the other side of Wales, and I ask her why she travels so far everyday and her answer is that she enjoys the drive, strange person. Polite yet awkward conversation dominates all the way through, and just as she drops me off, I notice she’s had a dog in the boot the entire time that hasn’t made a sound the entire time. She tells me to get the bus into Bangor from here, either that or it’s a hour and a half walk. S*d that, I’ve got this far without paying, I’m not giving up now.
It occurs to me, three quarters of an hour later, that if I was less stubborn, I’d be home by now. But no, I’ve got my plan, I’m sticking to it. Another three quarters of an hour later, and I realise that not only could I have got the bus back by now, but even at a leisurely stroll, I could’ve made it back. There’s only 5 miles in it! I’ve done 200 miles today, and I’m being stuffed by the final five! Wait, what’s this? The bloody Jesus Army! Here to taunt me in my hour of need! They drive by, oblivious, despite the frantic thumbing. B*****ds. Finally, a car pulls up with two blokes getting a curry from Bethesda and going back to Bangor. They are so chuffed that they picked up a hitcher, they actually ring their wives to tell them.
I get in, sit down, say hello to my housemates, and crack out a beer. I hardly get the chance to open my mouth to explain what’s happened the past couple of days before my phone goes off,
‘Hello James, how you doing mate? Cool… you won’t believe what I’ve just done…. What do you mean you don’t care?.... A party?... And how the hell do you expect me to get there?... You do realise what public transport is like these days?... And what if I can’t… You’ll do what to me?... Ok, ok, I’ll think of something…. Bye, you s**g.’
Oh dear God, not again.
My eyes opened. And suddenly there was pain. I shut them to make it go away, but my battle plan was fundamentally flawed due my consciousness. I rolled around to try and make it stop and ended up falling off the sofa and smacking my face on the floor. What a hangover. I turned my face away from the floor, and there it was, taunting me. The bag showed that yesterday was not a dream. Its presence showed that I had hitch hiked 200 miles just for a party. It also told me that, yes, I would be doing the same thing today, only in reverse.
It had been a good evening. There were drinks, there was music and there were hula skirts. Although it did come to an unfortunate end in a grotty scum infested nightclub in the centre of Leighton’s black heart, which, thanks to the rubbish pop and cheese music, the gnarly grizzled clubbers, and the general tedium of the club, I was forced to drink in huge quantities. Being 6’6, an ex-alcoholic and descended from Viking lineage, I can take a lot of drink, but I really pushed it. And of course, people kept buying me drinks because I had hitch hiked 200 miles and I can never say no to free alcohol.
It took 2 showers, 4 cups of rocket fuel coffee, several pints of water and more painkillers than is medically advisable before I regained my basic motor functions. I knew that I had to leave soon otherwise I wouldn’t make it back before dark. It was still raining outside, and I didn’t want to move at all. My mother took pity on me and said she’d get me off to a head start. I flailed my arms around in a hopeless attempt to gain the power of flight before accepting her offer and letting her drive me out of town to the A5 and a certain roadside cafe that can't be named, but involves dwalves and their culinary skills. I tried to convince her she wanted to drive me all the way, but she wasn’t having any of it.
‘I can’t do it. I simply can’t.’ I groaned, slurping down my 6th coffee of the day.
‘Well Gregg, you done it yesterday, and you did fine, you’ll be able to make it back,’ she replied.
‘You don’t understand, I just can’t. I can barely stand, let alone stick my thumb out. What if they try to r*pe me or something?’
‘No-one is going to r*pe you Gregg.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you are 6’6. The only people who would r*pe you are suicidal. Give me a good reason why you can’t make it back.’
‘Err…’ I swung back in my chair trying to think of something better than being hung over and the slim chance of being assaulted by the anti giant hippy coalition, ‘… because people smell funny.’
My plot to get my mum to drive me home had failed. She kindly bought me some breakfast, gave me a fiver for drinks and suchlike, gave me a tub of paracetemol, and headed back for Leighton Buzzard. Then it struck me. Card! I didn’t have any bloody card! Not again, not like last time. Ok, this is the outskirts of Milton Keynes, not Wrexham. Although Milton Keynes lacks any personality as a city whatsoever, there is more culture in a packet of walkers crisps, more soul in a Brittiny Spears album and more passionately constructed architecture in a kid’s clay modelling class, I figured as the entire place looks like its come in click together sets from Ikea, there’s probably some card about. Wrong.
Fortunately, people in Milton Keynes knew what card was. The problem was every shop I went into had already put it out in their recycling bins. Outside. In the rain. One person managed to find a piece of card the size of my hand for me, which was very nice of her, but to be honest, I would’ve been better off writing ‘A5’ on my forehead. I ended up finding a garage, and thought, ‘Garage, car parts, car parts come in boxes, CARD!’ and went in to inquire.
‘Hi, I’m hitch hiking to Wales and…’
‘Hitch hiking?’ The grease monkey looked disgusted, ‘Why don’t you get a job you hippy?’
‘I’ve got one already, I just like hitch hiking.’
‘Why don’t you get a car or something?’
‘Well, I would, but I have this awful tendency to crash. Look, I was just wandering if you had some card for a sign.’
‘Don’t have any card in here, I just stuck all of my card out in the recycling; it should be in the bin out front.’
‘Something tells me it won’t be much use to me. Do you have anything else?’
‘Yes, I have this,’ he said whilst offering me a broken number plate.
Well it was better than nothing. So, not wanting to endure this man’s company any longer, I accepted it, gave him my thanks, and went back to the main road. I stuck my thumb out, and the fun began. It would be worth nothing here that at one point I noticed 3 cars full of men in uniforms drive past me at one point. Why would it be worth noting? Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to tell you more later on. Why tell you now? To spark your interest so you read on. Half an hour of waiting and I got a lift with a passing breakdown engineer type called Ted.
Ted told me how he couldn’t read my sign, but he stopped out of pity. I explained how troublesome acquiring card can be, not just going through what had happened in Milton Keynes, but going through the entire Wrexham episode. Ted then instructed me to look in the back of the van. In between all the tools and jacks were several huge sheets of card. For a second I was elated, but then horror struck me.
‘You’re a serial killer of hitch hikers and steal their signs as mementoes!’ I exclaimed.
‘Haha, no, I just seem to collect a lot of boxes.’
‘What do you do with them all?’
‘Well apart from giving pieces to scabby hitchers, my son likes to make forts out of them, recycling that is you know.’
Ted could only take me about quarter of an hour down the A5 before he had to turn off. Didn’t turn out to be the problem I thought it might be because as soon as I step out of his truck and put my bag down, a voice came out from over my shoulder, “Alright mate, need a lift?” Ben, a random trucker, had seen me at the roundabout previously, but was going the other way. Just like Ted, he couldn’t take me too far down the A5, but any distance hitching is better than walking. The wasps sign in the cab was a good start, anyone who watches rugby dislikes football, and so we cussed soccer for the entire journey.
‘I can’t stand the bloody sport. Load of pansies, I tell you.’ Ben said when I brought it up. ‘I mean, they get touched on the shoulder and go down grabbing their shins! Who trains these guys to play? Ex-footballers or hulk bloody Hogan?’
‘I personally want to see Man U take on the All-Blacks. Just once. I think it would be the greatest sporting event of the millennium.’ I returned, ‘Ok, it would be over in a few seconds, but those few seconds would be more action packed than any football game ever. Imagine Rooney’s ugly face contorted in pain as the All-Blacks pack into him.’
‘I’d rather not imagine that little gimps face contorted if it’s all the same to you.’
‘Haha, I just don’t understand why people watch it. It’s 90 minutes of boring sport played by overpaid thugs, then after the match, instead of simply enjoying the game, people go out and split their opposition’s head open with whatever is to hand. What’s the point?’
‘Hey I don’t know. My dad always said to me that Rugby is an animal’s sport played by gentlemen, whilst football is a gentlemen’s sport played by animals. Too true as well.’
The conversation continued in much the same vain until we reached a junction where Ben went one way and I went another. And it’s a quiet junction in the middle of nowhere. I knew instantly I was going to be here for a while. My thumb ached at the very prospect. Undeterred, I went straight about it. A whole hour went by in the same place. Slowly, my mind unravelled, and the snapping point was when I saw the three cars full of air force types go by from earlier. What the hell? How did I get in front? Are they watching me? Are they, in fact, in league with the Jesus Army? I had better take a new approach, otherwise my sanity wasn’t going to survive this place. A sign change was in order here.
I ditched the sign saying A5 and tried to come up with some original, witty and would get people to stop all at the same time. But, after an hour of just watching people fly up grinning manically with their thumbs up at me, my mind was fried. ‘B*gger it,’ I thought, and scrawled the only two words I could think of that could get me out of this hole. With a renewed vigour and an energy that I didn’t think it was possible for me to summon this hungover, I went back to the road and proudly stuck out my thumb. It worked, within five minutes, I was in a car getting away from the nameless hole that for the past hour I had feared would become my new home.
‘Don’t Panic,’ said Steven, ‘most amusing. I like a bit of humour on my journeys.’
‘Hitch hikers guide fan are you?’
‘What’s that?’ Steven replied.
It took a while, but I managed to explain, in brief, the entire hitch hikers guide to him. He said he’d look it up sometime, and in return, explained to me, in brief, the entire history of the A5. Enough information, in fact, for me to write an entire entry for H2G2. But, fortunately for you, I’d rather have my scr*tum deep fat fried whilst still attached then write about the A5. I know what you’re thinking, ‘Yeah right Gregg, you’ll get bored one day, realise there isn’t an entry for the A5, and write one, loser.’ Well, just to stop your s*ck prophecy from coming true, and seeing as this entire story (Well, not the first one, but this one you are reading now) takes place exclusively on the A5, here’s an impromptu history lesson for you.
In the beginning, there was darkness. And in the darkness, there were Celts. Strange beings who enjoyed running around wearing woad on their chest and had no idea of how brilliant digital radio was. Then along came the Romans, who, despite also not knowing how great digital radio is, had a better idea of how things should be done. With them, the Romans brought roads. The Celts didn’t take to the idea of roads and civilisation too well, so the Romans did what any understanding and civilised race would’ve done, they slaughtered those who stood against them and enslaved the rest.
The A5 was made so that the Romans could get from one part of the country, namely Marble Arch in London, to another, namely Birmingham. Why anyone would want to go to Birmingham is entirely uncertain. The Romans then came up against a problem. They wanted the A5 to continue, but this meant going into Wales where there were mountains and more Celts who were still pretty opposed to this whole road idea. Then things got a bit out of hand back at Rome due to a high number of barbarians who were also against roads, and had to do the off.
The Welsh then decided that perhaps this whole road thing wasn’t as bad as some people had made out, and decided to extend the A5 to Holyhead. However, as is typical with the Welsh, they got the wrong end of the stick. Whereas the Romans had designed the A5 to be a flat, straight, A to B sort of affair, the Welsh got a bit creative, and decided to bend it round every bloody mountain in the Snowdonia range. And that’s the official version of events. There’s apparently a bike race that goes along it, but why anyone in Marble Arch would want to bike to Holyhead just so they can bike back again is beyond me.
Steven dropped me off, and seeing as he was a chef, had left me with a mixed bag of goodies, from onion bargies to quiche Lorraine. I decided to take a break from hitch hiking and put my feet up and eat and plan out my route from here. Hitch down the A5. Great, planning over, let’s get on with the eating. It was at this point I got my next lift. I started seeing a few bikes go by, some bikers on a mission to nowhere I presumed. I was just sat there, innocently eating with no protruding thumbs when one of the easy rider crew stopped.
‘Nice sign. I see you’ve got a jacket,’ he motioned to my leathers, ‘so I assume you know how to stay on. Need a ride?’
‘**** yeah. Want a bargie?’
I never caught his name, what he does or anything like that. To be honest, I don’t think he cared. This was by far the most exciting part of my entire journey. We roared down the A5, and bar the troublesome irish threesome from the last hike, this was the fastest I’d moved hitch hiking. Although I was on there for quite some time, it all went to soon, and I got dropped just before V Festival.
‘We go a different way from here, hike up the road a bit and you’ll be able to catch a ride with people leaving the festival. Don’t get stuck in the traffic. Happy travels.’
And he was off. I was stunned. He actually said happy travels. He also said a bit. It was three miles before I found a decent spot to hitch from. I finally got the other side of V festival and caught up with people leaving. The suddenly, there they were. The same three cars full of air force personnel. And no, I’m not using artistic license to make the story more exciting. They were there, again, just casually passing by me. This time though, one recognised me, and looked as shock as I was. A mere few moments later, and Dan pulled up.
Dan is a seasoned hitch hiker, and would probably like me to add that he is also a director and wants to direct your action, or something like that. You see that Dan, you got a free plug! Who said picking up hitchers never got you anything eh? Anyway, Dan is hardcore hitcher material. He makes Ford Prefect look like a guy who is just going for a shower. Just Dan can now afford a car, so doesn’t hitch himself, but still picks every vagrant he sees up. We went on a lot about the importance of hitch hiking, from the social aspect, to the environmental aspect, to just the enjoyment factor. He wants to set up a hitch hiking website, but seeing as there’s already liftshare website, I suggest that if you are interested in that sort of ‘planned’ hitch hiking, you go there. Strangely though, Dan also had never read the hitch hiker’s guide.
I also thought I’d stick one of Dan’s stories in here, just so I don’t have to talk about myself and the A5 the entire time. This is while he his hitch hiking in Australia, and a rather odd lift he caught. It was all going well, apart from the fact the trucker had a crazy look in his eyes. Dan thought this was due to some trucker drug, but it turned out to be something a lot more sinister…
Quarter of an hour into the journey; the trucker turns to Dan,
‘You see that glove box there, boy?
‘Yeah, what of it?’
‘I want you to open it,’ Dan does as he is told and finds a pair of nunchuku, just innocently sat there in the box.
‘You know what those are?’
‘Yes, there are nunchuku,’ Dan responded a bit uneasily.
‘I know how to use them as well,’ The trucker said, taking a darker, more sinister tone in his voice.
‘Oh,’ Dan managed.
‘Do you know what I use them for?’ The trucker asked, a menacing question that seemed to hang,
‘Err… no?’ Dan was scared to the point of nearly wetting himself.
‘S****ing up hitch hikers!’ The trucker roared with laughter, who then proceeded to take Dan on a three day whirlwind tour of Australia.
Dan dropped me off just outside his house, which, although is still on the A5, happens to be slap bang in the middle of Snowdonia. Who the hell is going to pick me up from here? Didn’t take me half as long as I expected, before a girl picks me up. She lives in Bethesda, a small town just outside Bangor and takes me from the middle of Wales to Bethesda. She works on the other side of Wales, and I ask her why she travels so far everyday and her answer is that she enjoys the drive, strange person. Polite yet awkward conversation dominates all the way through, and just as she drops me off, I notice she’s had a dog in the boot the entire time that hasn’t made a sound the entire time. She tells me to get the bus into Bangor from here, either that or it’s a hour and a half walk. S*d that, I’ve got this far without paying, I’m not giving up now.
It occurs to me, three quarters of an hour later, that if I was less stubborn, I’d be home by now. But no, I’ve got my plan, I’m sticking to it. Another three quarters of an hour later, and I realise that not only could I have got the bus back by now, but even at a leisurely stroll, I could’ve made it back. There’s only 5 miles in it! I’ve done 200 miles today, and I’m being stuffed by the final five! Wait, what’s this? The bloody Jesus Army! Here to taunt me in my hour of need! They drive by, oblivious, despite the frantic thumbing. B*****ds. Finally, a car pulls up with two blokes getting a curry from Bethesda and going back to Bangor. They are so chuffed that they picked up a hitcher, they actually ring their wives to tell them.
I get in, sit down, say hello to my housemates, and crack out a beer. I hardly get the chance to open my mouth to explain what’s happened the past couple of days before my phone goes off,
‘Hello James, how you doing mate? Cool… you won’t believe what I’ve just done…. What do you mean you don’t care?.... A party?... And how the hell do you expect me to get there?... You do realise what public transport is like these days?... And what if I can’t… You’ll do what to me?... Ok, ok, I’ll think of something…. Bye, you s**g.’
Oh dear God, not again.
